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Post by Sharei on Jun 1, 2023 16:27:22 GMT -6
It was while the woman was searching for a place to hide her new cache that she met the boy again. The old shelters she had been using had been an equally good choice for an opportunistic genasi, so when she ascended the slope to one of the little caves she'd selected - barely a cutout high up the rock - she found the squatter.
His presence was visible even from a distance. Someone had repaired the hanging vines and long leafy branches that had helped hide the entrance in among the trees that butted up against it, and the blanket behind them to keep out the breeze had been replaced by some kind of canvas, thick and heavy and dark green. The old dead reeds and dirt that had been piled near the back as bedding, long mildewing and rotted, had been shoved to and buried at the bottom of the slope.
A cautious approach revealed the stranger to be the spirit boy when she reached the mouth of the cave. He had changed the interior, swapping out the old reeds for scavenged wood he had fashioned into furniture. A small cut stump for a seat, a straight plank of wood on two appropriately sized rocks for a low table to be sat at. All of his armor and weaponry had been laid out there, equally scavenged for their valuable parts. Knives fashioned from hydra fangs and a mail shirt built from the hydra's own scales lay partially completed nearby. By the mouth of the cave a small bucket had been rigged to collect rainwater.
The boy himself was laying at the back of the cave. He had fashioned himself what passed for a bed, a couple of very straight cut boards on rocks to elevate it off the floor, and nothing else. The only comfort he seemed to possess was a pillow he'd created by bundling reeds in thick, soft leaves. He was laying there now, his pained breathing filling the cave. That, and the scent of his sickness, sweet on the air. He was leaning against the back wall, one leg pulled to his chest, the other stretched out in discomfort.
That second leg looked bad. The small cut, little more than a shallow wound a week before, had become infected and swollen. The skin was discolored around the edges and oozing puss from a new attempt at lancing it. The drainage had kept it from escalating too quickly, but there were dark circles under his eyes, and perhaps it was the lack of armor, but he seemed thinner. But he was awake, and he touched the swollen spot beneath his knee with a wince. It oozed more puss. Gritting his teeth, B3 pushed on it until it had stopped coming out, then rinsed the wound with a basin of water and a cloth he'd managed to salvage from cut strips of a spare shirt.
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Post by MP on Jun 2, 2023 0:36:58 GMT -6
The woman felt a moment of possessive anger, staring down at her shelter. Her resources. Her hard labor. The emotion was a breath of chill wind and a sickening drop in the pit of one's stomach. In that moment, there was a shadow at the entrance, and a spasm of black fingers, faint as moth wings over silk.
Her eyes moved over the fresh supplies, the crude comforts the boy had made for himself, the fangs and scales he'd taken for trophies - tools. The icy air eased a little. The size alone of the scales alone confirmed what she'd already guessed.
"You killed the female," she said with dull surprise. "How?"
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Post by Sharei on Jun 2, 2023 1:09:02 GMT -6
The spirit boy jumped in surprise at the sound of her voice. He hadn't heard her come up, nor had he sensed her presence at all. And there was something in the air; alarm, warning, threat. The spasm made him press harder on the wound than he'd intended, and the pain was in the sudden lines around his eyes, if not his expression.
But when he saw who the figure was - not some wraith come out of the darkness, but the woman he'd seen before - his shoulders relaxed.
"Laid traps then drove her into them," B3 said, easing the damp cloth off the wound. "Using the traps, she killed some of her own spawn in the flailing. The rest was open combat."
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Post by MP on Jun 2, 2023 1:47:32 GMT -6
She stared at his leg, the cut already weeping infection. No doubt the water, she thought. No doubt the gore from the dying spawn. She raised a hand, pointing at the old embers outside.
"Fire."
An order, spoken in the same dull tone.
There was an old pit she'd dug nearby, several hands wide and nearly a full hand deep. She instructed him how to line it with his scraps of canvas and fill it with his water supply. To light the fire and heat old stones she'd left in camp, using them to bring the new pool to a boil. Even if the place had once been hers, she was reluctant to handle the spirit's things and encourage similar borrowing. When the curls of steam began to fade over the water's surface, she pointed for him to soak his leg. The pit would need to be carefully cleaned each time, she thought.
"The water must be hot," she said. "Morning, night, and after travel."
She stood over him, arms folded, the set of her stance all but forbidding him to move from the near scalding puddle. When the water cooled, she instructed him to move more stones. But after nearly half an hour, she was satisfied. The woman ushered him away from the puddle with one shivering finger.
"Dry it and cover it well."
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Post by Sharei on Jun 4, 2023 12:13:19 GMT -6
She had had to really bully him into the pool to get him to soak the leg. B3 had hesitated on the side of it, reluctant to touch the steaming heat it produced. She couldn't know it, but heat was hard for him physically, and by the time they'd finished soaking his leg several things had happened. His body had changed, for one, developing webbing-like membranes between the fingers and toes. His skin where the water touched it had changed as well, becoming more porous and amphibian-like. The boys pupils had taken on a slit quality, and they widened and shrank as the light shifted. But he also became very, very warm, and a flush of heat could be seen in his cheeks when he rose to dry the wound. The boy wobbled, nearly passed out, then went to do as he'd been instructed.
Dry and cover it, she'd said. B3 picked up the lengths of clean cloth they'd cut and dabbed gently at it with one. When it was reasonably dry he covered it with the others, tying secure knots with shaking fingers.
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Post by MP on Jun 5, 2023 0:26:54 GMT -6
The woman observed this transformation from a distance. Though she would never admit it, never allow it to show on her face, she was unnerved by this proof - plain, irrefutable - of the spirit's true nature.
Still. Creature or not, that boy had killed one of the hydra mothers. If he lived long enough, perhaps he really could rid the wetlands of hydras for good. If, she thought, watching his shaking hands. He was sick, and the hunger was beginning to tell on his frame.
She seated herself by the entrance, a casual poise from which she could quickly rise if the need arose - from without or within.
"You need to stop the hunt until the infection breaks," she said. "Their nesting waters are tainted. It will kill you faster than the hydra."
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Post by Sharei on Jun 6, 2023 19:14:14 GMT -6
If I can even find the nesting waters, B3 thought sourly.
The spirit boy, favoring the leg in question, gingerly sat down on the makeshift cot. He knew that she was right, but what other choice did he have? The longer he spent out here in the woods, the longer it was before he could return to the modern world and modern medicine. But if he killed himself in the process of completing the mission, what good would modern medicine be? What if the infection didn't break? Would he be waiting out his own death?
The boy's blue eyes rose to the woman. Watched her. Appraised her.
"Mm. You live in the swamp?"
"No," the woman said. B3 frowned in confusion.
"But you're here."
"The fish are here."
A hunting range then. B3 considered her again, hesitated, then pressed on anyway. What was there to lose?
"I need to finish the mission. You need your hunting range to be hydra free. We could help each other," he said slowly. "You know about the area, migration paths, how to read the fauna, and how to survive here. With your help I could find nests quicker and close the gap on the broodmother. I could kill her if I could find her."
He gestured at the pile of scales and fangs. He still couldn't understand how a creature as big as a hydra kept eluding him, but he supposed these specimens were smaller than most. Still. Frustrating.
"If you help me complete my mission and leave safely then I will ensure you a safer range once the hydra are dead. Better places to hunt. I'll even bring you with me when I leave, if you want."
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Post by MP on Jun 11, 2023 17:28:11 GMT -6
The woman was silent, her dark eyes moving up and down his face in obvious appraisal. She'd seen it happen now and again: survivors banding together, for mutual protection or to hear a friendly voice. She'd joined one or two. None of them had lasted long. None of them had ended prettily. She would not have even considered the offer if it came from a human being. But she was unused to spirits. Unused to this uncanny confidence.
She looked toward the woods - unforgiving, hated, but known. Her gaze seemed to search the shadows. Even in contemplation, she kept the spirit in her peripherals.
"Fine," she said at last. "But I trust you to keep the spawn away while we track her."
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Post by Sharei on Jun 15, 2023 20:28:32 GMT -6
When the woman agreed B3 brightened, his face a little less grey as he flashed her a sharp-toothed grin. He shifted, eased the weight off his left side, and contemplated the small shelter again. It was barely big enough for one, but they could probably make it work. They were both small enough. It wasn't like trying to share a space with B6.
There was also the matter of food. He'd foraged, but what he'd gathered wasn't nearly enough for him, let alone someone else. They'd have to do something else.
"Can you cook?"
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Post by MP on Jun 18, 2023 18:28:32 GMT -6
She jerked her head in a small, noncommittal shrug. There was something unsettling in it, the muscles moving in ways they shouldn't. Only for a moment. Surely only a trick of the dark.
"Sometimes."
She remembered old recipes, it was true. But she hadn't had the supplies, the tools, the luxury for real cooking lately. She couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten a real meal. She couldn't remember a meal at all.
The corners of the woman's mouth turned downward as she lingered on the thought. Then she looked away, eyes fixed on the forest. Her gaze was focused, her tone strategic, as if she'd forgotten the topic of food completely.
"With the female, her sister will try to claim her territory. Tomorrow, we should check the nests you destroyed."
Sister.
The word bothered her. It itched at her mind. The woman's fingers curled in the dirt, and a dark beetle slithered out from between her fingers. The hate was a black curl in her chest, inexplicable, dangerous. She watched the woods as if her gaze could skewer their target where it stood. They would kill this monster, yes. They would take the territory for their own. She would see the boy out safely, and then she would clear her hunting grounds of these problems, these worries. And then she would resume her real hunt.
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Post by Sharei on Jun 25, 2023 20:05:28 GMT -6
B3 stared at her, his growing suspicion solidifying into certainty. There was just something too other about her for her to be human. The thought shot a bolt of ice down his spine, warning him in no uncertain terms that he couldn't collude with a monster. But was she a monster? She'd left no footprints on the banks, nor had she collected any cattails despite him watching her do it. She hadn't touched him at all - she hadn't touched anything, come to think of it. There were all sorts of types that didn't touch people and didn't leave footprints, but ones that were also transparent at the edges? B3 hadn't seen it happen often, but if the right lighting hit her he swore he could see through the edge of her silhouette.
Was she a spirit? A ghost? What was the policy about interacting with ghosts? The genasi wracked his brain but couldn't think of any. Zramek didn't deal in ghosts. At least, Facility 101 didn't. They couldn't be used for parts or research, and while they did sometimes hurt or harm humans, the facility never sent them out to deal with it. Just as they didn't send out an asset to fight a wolf. Did that mean Zramek didn't consider them monsters? That they were a natural part of the world order?
B3 decided that it did and put any further doubt out of mind. She could help him survive this nightmare and that was all that mattered.
And he was determined to survive, though the godforsaken bog didn't make it easy. The infection worsened before it got better, leaving the boy in a debilitative state of poor health. Yet even when he was scraping the bottom of his reserves for strength he never failed to make it down to the pool to cleanse the wound. He rested when he could afford to and foraged when he couldn't, somehow scrounging enough to live by on determination and grit alone. He spent his downtime carving bone and scale to fashion tools and equipment. He even managed to make a patchwork blanket from scavenged scraps. A good thing, for the nights could get chilly despite the time of year. Or maybe that was the fever talking. It didn't matter as long as it cleared. Once the hydra was dead he could return to the facility and receive better treatment.
Or that was the plan, anyway. Despite the heavy fever, despite the lethargy and exhaustion, B3 noticed when the woman began to draw back. Every day she seemed more distant than the last until eventually she was hanging around the edge of the camp more often than not. Even that night, with the rain pelting down on the heavy canvas that protected the cave's entrance, she sat as far forward in the shelter as she could. He read her disillusionment in the lines of her body and in the tone of her voice. She was planning to leave.
He could barely process the resentment and frustration the thought caused. It was outweighed by the way she perched by the entrance, where a chill wind kept flicking the edge of the canvas up. Each time it lifted a blast of cold air rushed across the bottom of the cave. Could ghosts feel the chill? They didn't have physical bodies, surely, but she seemed weirdly solid to him. Maybe she did feel it.
Gripping the makeshift blanket with one hand, B3 hauled himself off the cot. Clumsy feet dragged over to the woman where he carefully draped the blanket around her thin shoulders.
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Post by MP on Jun 26, 2023 20:17:07 GMT -6
She foraged to make up for her companion, kept watch at night, left him the bulk of their supplies - and it wasn't enough. The food seemed to disappear faster than she could gather it. And the genasi's sickness worsened. She had seen it before: the way their faces hollowed with hunger and sickness, the growing rattle in their breath. The bleak silence after was always the worst part. She could feel it coming - coming in spite of the spirit's confidence. Mortal after all. This time would be no different than any of the others. Why would it?
As she became increasingly sure of the fact, she began to withdraw. Keeping to the edge of the camp. Keeping her contact with the spirit to a minimum. It couldn't hurt if you didn't risk anything. Finally, staring out at the woods one grey morning, she made up her mind to go. She would leave the swamp to the hydras, which would surely repopulate in a matter of weeks. She would move toward the foothills, anticipating the prey that would flee to higher ground and away from the hydras. From there, she could stockpile enough to resume her-
She looked up as the blanket fell over her shoulders. The spirit was grey, unsteady on his feet, and he had used that failing strength to bring it over to her. A long moment passed. The woman stared down at her covered shoulder, her lips pressing to a thin line. She stood sharply, the blanket clutched in one white-knuckled hand. Her fingers tightened on it, lifted it as if to cast it down. Then with an exhale like a breeze through the leaves, she let it fall to the ground - the ground, where it had lain from the start - and stalked away into the woods.
She walked until all she could hear was the rain. Until all trace of the camp was gone. there she stood, the dark trees all around her, her face turned toward the canopy. Her mouth opened, closed again, the howl of frustration dying before it ever reached her lips. It was survival, she told herself. Survival.
The child's stare stuck in her mind. The weight of the blanket on her shoulders while he shivered and swayed.
Is this what you are now?
She was alive. That was what mattered.
Alive because you take supplies from dying children? Because you leave them behind to starve like an animal? Like his handler?
She put a palm against the nearest tree, seeking stability, oblivious to the deep furrows her fingers dragged through the bark. With a hiss of breath, she turned and stalked back to camp.
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Post by Sharei on Jun 26, 2023 20:36:47 GMT -6
When the woman returned the shelter was as she had left it. All except the blanket, which sat on the floor neatly folded where she had been sitting. The boy had returned to his cot to lay on his side, his gaze on the door. A knife had been tucked neatly into his hand where it lay, something he'd given up with a second person there to keep watch. The defense hadn't been necessary.
So when the canvas fluttered and she walked back in B3's eyes widened in surprise. He clearly hadn't expected her to be back.
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Post by MP on Jun 26, 2023 21:56:41 GMT -6
She had the blanket in her hand. The woman didn't look down at it, didn't notice the way the ends of her fingertips had twisted and withered where they held it - held the real thing. She came to the bedside and, in a stiff, stilted motion, dropped it over the boy's thin frame. The blanket looked as if it had seen ten years, motheaten and tattered and faded almost to grey. But it was at least some paltry barrier against the wind. The woman seemed not to see the state of it.
"Keep warm," was all she said.
And then she withdrew, back to her side of the tent, her spot by the entrance. She turned her face to the woods, avoiding the boy's gaze.
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Post by Sharei on Jul 16, 2023 18:35:31 GMT -6
B3 looked down at the motheaten blanket, the glow in his eyes that had begun at her approach easing into a gentler hue. He spread his hands over the cloth and, despite its appearance, pulled it around his shoulders as if it were the most precious thing he'd ever been given. In the life of an asset, particularly the only C-Class of the batch, it was liable to be the only thing he was ever given.
The sickness dragged on regardless of the blanket, as did the rain, washing away potential tracks and signs of life. But where the hydra benefitted, so did B3. It meant cleaner sources of water now that there was someone to teach him about those contaminants, and less heating to reach temperature once they were removed. It meant less foraging, for with B3's ability to sense water he able to determine if prey was nearby, and with the ghost woman's ability to cook, meat was back on the table. It was through this constant vigilance and working together that they were able to catch a deer in a nearby snare.
B3's health was improving too. The infection was starting to abate and his fever had finally broken. The doe had been a timely catch and the meat alone lasted them days, even if B3 had had to fend off predators for the carcass. After the first couple of bouts with scavenging wolves, the local wildlife seemed to get the hint. Like the hydra, the wildlife began viewing the spirit boy as one of the alpha predators of the bog and left the two largely alone.
With his improving health came the resumption of his duties. B3 was out every day stalking the landscape, looking for tracks, and referring to the ghost woman for her opinion. Her tracking expertise was invaluable in regaining lost ground, and even further still when her ability to predict the hydra's movements brought them within reaching distance of the latest nest. But rather than attack, B3 warned them back, sensing something about the site that didn't sit well in his gut. The reason came the next evening when, heavily laden with more eggs, the broodmother returned to her newborn clutch.
It was good for them then that the ghost woman had prompted B3 to build a hunter's tree stand, upwind of the nest and high out of sight. There they hunkered, going over the last of the plan as the broodmother turned in for the night. And when all fell quiet below, B3 moved.
It was a chaotic battle. Flashes of the pale spirit boy ducking between the darker hides of the smaller hydra made calling out their locations easier for the ghost, who kept careful watch from the protection of her tree. From this vantage she cautioned him on incoming threats and predicted movement patterns, giving him the birds-eye view his handler should have been feeding him. The extra help saved him from several nasty wounds simply for the heads up it provided. That, and the shouted instruction of left! when his quick footing missed his marker, too busy following the movements of the big one to properly gauge the distance. He corrected. The hydras gave chase, only to fall to their deaths in a spiked pit the pair had dug and concealed the night before.
That just left the broodmother. B3 whipped around, but the woman's warning came too late. One of its forward limbs slammed into the boy, splitting armor and cracking bone. His body was flung so violently that the rock he crashed into split on the impact. Dead, surely. But the boy, bleeding from four long gashes across the abdomen, pulled himself out of the rubble as the beast lumbered forward. He rolled, pitching sideways to avoid the brunt of the beast's bulk, and slunk between it's smaller back legs with a heavy limp.
The water sloshed as the beast turned, kicking up gushes that seemed sharper than they should have. The razor-water bounced off the armored hide just as B3 knew it would, but the distraction earned him enough time to get into a better position before a set of jaws snapped shut over where he had just been.
Back and forth they danced, the fate of both combatants hanging on an infinite number of miniscule missteps. But it was B3's final stroke that decided it. It was no swing, no sword strike, no weapon that could penetrate hide. It was something as simple, yet as foreign to him as love or joy.
Fear.
When your opponent fears you, the rough tones of Moira, A2's handler, whispered in his ear. Then the moment when you give the fear its own rein, give it time to work, it becomes terror. A terrified man, a terrified beast, fights himself. He is at his most dangerous, but can always be relied upon to make the fatal mistake that will be his undoing.
B3 planted his feet, waited, and when the Hydra came at him again saw the opening he'd been waiting for. The weakened leg twinged as he lunged, threatening to topple him, but a gust of water carried him up and over the outreaching claws. Something wet and hot flooded the side of his shirt as he landed on top of the beast's snout. His hands were slick with blood he wasn't sure was his or theirs as he plunged the dagger into the broodmother's eye, right through the socket to the grey matter beyond.
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