An Age of Mysterious Memories

B 2 C 38: Breakout

We spend several days in prison, in separate cells. The prison is a bit of a joke, sure it’s cobblestone for walls, but it has thin wood, or leather ceilings. Even worse, it seems ‘critterfolk’ don’t deserve normal cells, and are tossed in essentially a pig pen with a padlock. It’s humiliating and infuriating. On the third day I’m finally informed of what the charges for my arrest were. I’ve been arrested for impersonating a noble.

As far as I know, I never claimed to be a noble, I just let people think it. I definitely didn’t claim to be from any specific family, so they don’t really have any ground to stand on.

Telepathically I send to my beloved inner circle to stay strong. Lu disappeared in the confusion at the end of the fight, which is good for her, bad for us. If I don’t know where she is, I don’t know that she’s safe, and have a harder time focusing. Still, it’s better this way, they stripped Lil’s scarf and hat as well as Teuila’s brand new dress. I think they may have just tossed their clothes in the fire.

Regardless, this is as close as I’m going to get to a chance to talk to someone in charge now. I spend several days pleading to be allowed to make my case to someone in power. I’m finally told I’ll be taken to Priscilla, commander of armed forces and prison warden, tomorrow.

We can’t afford to break out until after I speak to her, so I beg Lil and Teuila to keep it together a little bit longer. Luni contacts us telepathically to say she’s trapped nearby, she had let herself get caught after making sure all of our belongings were hid safely in her inventory. At least Lu is safe.

I try to insinuate repeatedly that the army needs to divert their march just slightly, but I’m not sure if my guards communicate that to Priscilla.

I’m dragged through the halls, if you can call open air walkways between shoddily constructed cells halls. Eventually we end up walking in circles til we’re not that far from my cell or the cells with Lil and Teuila. There’s a fairly luxurious looking tent stationed here.

Two guards jab spears against my neck from opposite sides and walk me into the tent. My hands are still cuffed behind my back, and I haven’t been fed in days. Or at least, they haven’t fed me. It was easy enough to hide my face in a corner and apparate some fish close enough to consume it. Lil and Teuila did the same.

A stately woman in a pristine uniform sits behind a long table, and motions for the guards to roughly seat me. Once I’m seated, she begins, “I am Priscilla, but you may refer to me as Madam Warden. You are brought here, Billie, under charges of impersonating a noble.”

I roll my eyes as I reply, “Thank you for clarifying madam warden, but I’m actually here to make a request of you and your military. I want you to divert your military slightly before the falls at the edge of fire biome. I’d like you to let me and my friends go. I’m willing to trade quite the wealth of supplies to make this happen. I’d even be interested in opening trade relations between our settlements. Shellcracker Pond is growing by the day.”

Priscilla replies, “Settlements? Surely you jest, you and the three savages you travel with couldn’t possibly have a thing worth negotiating for.”

I bite my tongue as I continue to argue my case, “It’s more than just the four of us, we have a full family that we continue to expand. We’ve been building a community, a town.”

Priscilla pauses, seemingly weighing whether or not to bother continuing the conversation. Or perhaps she’s weighing if the information she shares will constitute spilling state secrets. She finally states, “I’ll admit, it’s something of a mystery how a bunch of critterfolk last seen on the southern coast, ended up all the way upriver, and more of a mystery that you’ve somehow got them constructing actual buildings for you, but I’ll wave that off as the dumb luck of a wild child.”

I bite back tears of rage at the insinuation that ‘critterfolk’ couldn’t just construct buildings on their own and lead civillized lives.

I start to crack under the pressure as I request, "You don’t need to march through our settlement. Why are you even doing this? What purpose does this war serve? Please, disband or reroute this war effort, I'll get you anything and everything you need, just please, don't do this. Let my friends go. I can become more powerful than any of your forces. In a week’s time I’ll have more potency than anyone in your armed forces, and I’d be willing to do anything you asked."

She interrupts, "We need land for our crops, and our populace."

Her answer is utterly ludicrous, it has to be a lie, there’s thousands of acres of untapped land from here to there, maybe millions of square miles all told. I blurt out, "Forget the crops, I can get you literally infinite respawning fish. As I was saying, if you give me another week, I'll be back at the same level as any of yours. I've already sacrificed more than double the highest among you has ever had. I'll reach that level again too."

Before I can continue, she ignores my assertions entirely as she interrupts again, to literally speak down her nose at me, "Oh no, don't tell me you haven't heard? The leviathans have been on the move, deleting entire swarms of fish spawn all across the oceans. Soon there will be none left. Perhaps then if we're lucky, the Leviathans will die. More likely though, they'll raise the sea levels, and come to claim the lands. We must grow stronger before then, and if it's on the backs of others, so be it."

My fury rises at this leader's callousness. I then realize, or at least start to believe, she's not even a leader, she's just some, some middle management war monger general goon who gets off on a power trip. There's no way they'd have taken me to see their leader. If this was their real leader, I could end this insufferable fool's life right here. She not just condones, but desires the subjugation of others. It's deplorable, detestable. This worthless pile of inhuman trash, and everyone in this city can go straight to hell.

Gritting my teeth, I manage to carefully choke out a warning, "I must warn you, that if you continue this course of action, I will not take it sitting down." The spearmen at my back keep their spears trained on my neck from either side. The points rest against my most vulnerable flesh.

The haughty commander laughs, spittle flying into my face as she closes in to whisper, "Silly child, you've been bound in the strongest magisteel cuffs this kingdom has to offer. Not to mention, if I so much as snap my fingers or blink threateningly, your head comes clean off."

I try not to let myself sneer as I growl back, "I'd be less worried about my head, and more worried about your own. I want my family's safety, and I want you to keep your gorram military path away from our settlement! I've been offering you, time and time again, I'm willing to do nearly anything."

She actually cleans her nails in front of me to look disinterested. It’s such a classic villainous move as a power play. When she looks back she makes a face as if she just realized I was still here before continuing. She actually reiterates and repeats herself from earlier, "Please, you have nothing to offer, you're some savage bunch of miscreants living off of fish and wood. It’s a mystery for sure, that critterfolk we’d scouted existing on the beach many months ago, are now the same ones we happened upon in a different scouting mission far to the north, some quaint little home near the falls. We know you traveled upriver from the ocean, it's a marvel you even survived the swamp, what with that ghastly beast out there. It ate a platoon of my best."

The insinuation that they’ve had people near my family twice without my knowledge makes me nervous, but the fact that she brought up Octorochi as having eaten an entire platoon causes me to laugh out loud as I let her know how we survived, "I killed it."

She blinks before her face returns to one of disinterest. She asks plainly, "You what?"

I can’t help but boast, "I f'king Killed that abhorrent serpent, with a capital K."

Priscilla scoffs, "Child, it's not nice to swear at, nor lie to adults, let alone your superiors. And if you do want to lie, at least make it believable. I think perhaps it's time we teach you some lessons. Go ahead you two, cut the child, but only a little, maybe suffering their first booboos will teach this child not to talk back to their betters."

This idiot knows I was taken in after winning three exhibition matches, and she thinks this will be the first time I’ve ever been hurt. I’ve literally been reborn in flames. I've had it with this insufferable prick. I claim the cuffs on my wrists, and the spears touching my neck to my inventory. Then I eject one of Octorochi's heads that I’d been saving since Teuila first transformed into Valkyrie. I launch it straight into her face.

"Believe me now!?" I seethe at her as I materialize the spears facing the reverse direction, now trained on the necks of her two guards. "You will alter your course, or I will gorram end you and every last being in this horrid city! I've played nice, I've begged, I've offered up my services and my soul, but you literally spat in my face. This is your last warning!"

I risk energy debt and take on my more adult, more authoritative-looking form so that I can crack my knuckles to add to the intimidation. I veritably radiate blood-intent. In fact, since every other being in existence who isn’t me can see aura to some extent, I actually literally radiate a perceivable killing intent. This supposed leader soils herself as I growl. Sending thoughts into my bond, I ask Lil and Teuila if they're ready. When they confirm I tell them to break out, get Luni to safety, then head here.

The fib I'm about to tell hurts my very soul, as I'm about to basically refer to Lil as a pet, "My dragon is on its way, as is my personal angelic knight. You have until they arrive to plot a different course through the jungle, or we start a massacre."

Priscilla seems to regain her composure, "You're, you're bluffing, you wouldn't."

"Do I look ilke I don't kill?" I eject more viscera of the serpent onto the table. "What will it be? I'm not even asking you to stop your stupid war, I'm asking you to angle your troops around my settlement. You have about ten seconds. Ten, nine."

She stammers, "Surely, surely you jest, you don't just have a dragon on call." Since she interrupted me, I continue counting silently, eight, seven, six. Her interrupting stammer finally ends.

Since she stopped interrupting me, I continue aloud, "Five."

My continuation that went unheard unnerves Priscilla. She nervously asks, "Wait, what about eight seven and six?"

"Four, three" Lil's wings can be heard flapping now, and this commander's eyes shoot wide with utmost terror. Sweat is running down her forehead into her eyes in rivulets. I can tell it stings but she dares not blink it away.

Priscilla finally relents, "Okay! Yes, yes, I cede, we will change course by a single half day's march."

I’m not satisfied anymore, I ask, "And?"

Priscilla nearly begs, "And what? That's good enough, isn't it? It's what you asked for!"

"And you will never, ever, darken my family's doorstep, ever again. If I so much as catch a whiff that anyone from your city has been within ten miles of my home, or its newly expanded borders, I will return here and burn this entire forsaken cesspool to the ground." Lil lands with Valkyrie-Teuila riding atop them. I think into my bond that I had to risk energy debt, so as soon as this fool agrees, we need to get out of dodge so that I can pass out.

Lil's response on our mental wavelength is somewhat comforting. "Sure thing buddy, sorry about this nightmare."

Teuila's response is downright proud. "I heard everything you said to this dirtbag. You're the best."

I'm starting to try a little too hard to avoid thinking about certain triggering topics. Having a panic attack right now would probably blow the whole charade, then I'd actually have to kill everyone here. Hm, for some reason, I'm not afraid of that thought, nor am I really upset about it either. When did I become a killer? What did the dream say? Death’s a bloody business, but it’s my business? Am I really fated to become that ruthless?

The dirtbag, as Teuila referred to her, finally acquiesces, "Yes, of course, of course all of our forces will be instructed to stay away from your, what was it again? Smashyshell lake?"

Through gritted teeth and a hateful sneer I barely manage to say "Shellcracker Pond. Thank you, we're done here. Don't worry about letting my friends go, I already had them rescued while we were having this conversation. In case you still think we're bluffing, ruminate on that. Goodbye. If you are very, very lucky, you will never see me again." I draw into my inventory; the spears, the viscera, and serpent head, leaving only a bloody smear for good measure. One of the few things that actually bleeds in this world, other than humans, and me, is the occasional item left behind by some creature or another. Even those rarely have blood.

Thinking into my bond, I'm veritably fuming, but also exhausted. Guys, quick, quick, get me out of here.

Teuila makes a polite nod, as if acknowledging an equal or superior officer, she then offers me a leg up to mount Lil. Lil crashes through the tent roof as they rise to the sky. Finally I can drop my form and pass out.

I said I can drop my form and pass out. Oh come on, what now? Huh, my energy is recovering. But, but I can't drop my form. Is this the price for my willingness to kill?

Is that Sal and Har hanging out east of town near the forest? I ask aloud, “Lil, Te, where did you drop Luni off?”

They nervously reply approximately where Sal and Har are located. My fury rises but I try to remind myself that these two conceded their match and used an easily dodgeable wind attack on me when I was surrounded by poison. They could very well be allies.

Still, if they’ve harmed Luni, I’m going to just kill everyone here for good measure, consequences be damned, the accord I just negotiated be damned. Hm, the sin crawling on my back the most really is wrath.