Born a Monster

Chapter Type: Light Conflict, Social

“You’ll never take us alive!” This was followed by a crossbow bolt.

[You have suffered a RED...]

[Champion point used. You have suffered an ORANGE...]

I activated Duck For Cover, since I was already diving behind a desk.

[Ability Activated. You have suffered a YELLOW critical for double damage from a base of eight Piercing damage, for a total of 16. After armor, six points of damage have been taken. 8/80 health remain.]

I pulled the crossbow bolt out of my left armpit and assessed the bleeding.

“Zhen Zui has a weapon!” someone cried. “Guards, guards!”

.....

I flipped my head around the edge of the desk. Zhen Zui, the youth who had shot at me, decided to shoot again. Stupid self-reloading crossbows.

The combat didn’t reach a point where it was raging, but apparently Zhen Zui wasn’t alone.

Damn it all! He had ten shots left, and every time any piece of me cleared any edge of that desk, he took a shot at it. I mean, full marks for effort, of course, but I really wished I understood why I was expected to take anyone anywhere.

By the laughing gods, the Daurians may finally try to kill me this time, I thought.

I suppose one Daurian was, and his name was Zhen Zui.

“Hey, Zhen Zui, do you want to surrender so that we can talk about this?”

“No. You hear that noise? That’s your allies, killing mine. But you are too late, do you hear? The one you came here for is long gone.”

There was a loud CHUNK noise as he shot the desk. I suppose he could take out the whole desk, but it had an impressive amount of damage resistance for an inanimate object, and more Condition than most people had health points.

Okay, the one... I came for? Nope, no clue. I was here with messages for Madonna, Kismet, and Gamilla, and one for copying and mass sending to all the commanders and major civilian entities.

I tried to go over my list of everyone I could declare vengeance on, but it had been deleted during the System reboot. Besides, most of those were south of the wall. “Zhen Zui, I’m willing to bet my skin this isn’t a case of mistaken identity. Unless you’re about to tell me there’s another serpent headed person on this island.”

“You are known to the Nine and all their agents, Rhishisikk. Spawn of Darkness! Agent of Fate! How are YOU the harbinger of a hundred years of oppression and slavery? Ah-ah-ah, you are hiding behind a desk! From me!”

KWA-THANG! He bounced a quarrel off the floor, sending it disturbingly near my right hip.

The Nine? Weren’t they spies? They must be really bad ones, if they didn’t know I was already off that task force. And yet, look at all the chaos they were causing. What were GOOD spies capable of?

“I think you’re forgetting that I’m also the doom of some lord or other.” I shouted back.

Cripes. ALL of my System lists seem to have been corrupted. I might actually have to re-learn everyone’s names. Well, I knew the Admiral was also Kwan Lun, and there was Mei of the sure hands. And... dang it, that one almost hit me. Combat was no time for this; I closed my System window.

I sighed. I’d lived through enough sieges; you never gave up cover you didn’t need to. But with the adrenaline spiking, the time just streeeeeetched.

“Okay, enough about me. What about you, Zhen Zui? What did it take for them to turn you traitor against your military oaths?”

“I am betraying NOTHING!” he said, his next quarrel bouncing off the floor well to the left (my left, not his) of the desk. “I am a patriot! I seek to contain the proper prisoners here, but to return their children, their grandchildren, all their descendants, let THEM, who are not convicted of crimes, return to the Empire.”

“I don’t disagree,” I said, “but surely there is a reason they are kept here, if it’s been going on that long?”

“Negligence! Negligence and apathy from a distant Empire. And what of the descendants of the guards? Why can we not return home? Why can we not bask in the glory of an Empire so grand that entire islands serve it as prisons?”

Wait... the guards...? How did I not know this earlier?

Speaking of guards, just as I was learning things some of them emerged from deeper in the warehouse and swarmed Zhen Zui. Of course, just when I was starting to learn things...

I betrayed my position with a massive yawn, and thus decided to stand up. One of the guards had a head wound, and none of them were in a condition more than vaguely resembling intact. But... I didn’t have the health to resist when they decided they were escorting me inside.

“Ling Sashi, night shift manager of Central Message Dispatch.” said the man they brought me to.

“My name is Rhishisikk.” I said.

He mangled my name twice before I said:

“Or you can just call me Little Monitor.”

“That is much easier to remember.” he said. “May I ask why you are attacking my employees?”

“I attacked no-one.” I said. “Feel free to search me; I currently have no serviceable weapons.”

“Frisk him.” Ling Sashi said.

The guards did so, one on my left side, one on my right; they made short and thorough work of the task.

“Very well; it is clear you didn’t come here to kill people. Why are you here?”

I explained the messages I wanted to send. “You mean to die at the hands of our copysmiths? You realize it will take us two days just to make that many copies?”

“The message is not urgent.” I said. “It only details that the ancient contract with the earth elementals has been broken, and that is why they destroyed the inmate base nearest the Rice Gate.”

“The elementals are on our side?” one of the guards asked.

“No.” I said, “The elementals don’t seem to care that there are multiple sides of humanity involved in this war. They just took the two thousand or so closest to a ledge as a gesture of how angry there are.”

“A gesture?” Ling Sashi asked. “Just how upset are they?”

I shrugged. “They discussed shaking the island hard enough to break the bedrock and kill a few hundred.”

“That doesn’t happen here.” said the other guard. “Not on that scale.”

“My apologies, then, I must have misheard.”

“But this message, it will save the lives of loyal guardsmen?” Ling Sashi asked.

“It should, if everyone on the island takes heed and starts honoring the treaty.” I said.

He snorted. “No chance of that happening; I therefore assess this message at low priority. We will work on it only after all higher priority traffic has been dealt with. It may take weeks for the copies to be made, and longer for them to be delivered.”

“But they will, eventually, be delivered?” I asked.

He scoffed. “Low priority messages are rarely read by the commanders, or even by their first advocates. With the siege going on, whomever reads it might not even relay it up the chain of command.”

“May I choose to submit the message anyway?” I asked.

“Xhi Wang, show him to the desks he needs. I need to write the official report on this incident. With luck, no more loyal soldiers will be having our heads cut off.”

When we were out of his office, I asked Xhi Wang. “Is that really a possibility, people getting executed?”

He nodded enthusiastically. “There are many laws you can break that the punishment is death. Allowing one’s subordinates to commit treason is among those.”

I had to blink. “Wait, so otherwise loyal officers may have no choice if they want to live other than to join in the treason? I... I just don’t think I have enough sleep to process that properly.”

Xhi Wang waved a hand. “Feel free to fall asleep on any bench you see. By the time you wake up, your messages will be day shift’s problem. If that is your choice, I wish you luck negotiating with them.”

“No.” I said. “Let’s go ahead and at least get this process started.”

And, even with the bustle of work, all of the messages I needed to submit were done before many day shift workers began showing up. Many of those who did brought pillows and sheets, using the benches as makeshift beds.

I didn’t have either of those things, but the benches weren’t as hard as stone, or as cold. I made good progress toward getting to sleep when I saw the sky lightening in color through a window.

Dang it.

[You have gone a night without sleep. Six sanity and six serenity have been deducted from your totals.]

I blinked, taking a good long breath before opening my eyes.

Oh well, off to find breakfast, I decided.

It was going to be a busy day.