Chapter Text
“Wächter.”
Patterns and thoughts float in the netherspace. Everything is comfortable, flowing. Like sand, warmed by the red glow of dusk, slipping through outstretched fingers. There’s a distinct familiarity on her mind – has she been here before ?
“Wächter.” A name, chosen. Is it hers ? The noise is more insistant, now. The sand gives way, and she’s falling, falling, the ground coming up fast –
– and she wakes up with a gasp, the ghost of a sharp stinging pain on the nape of her neck still vivid.
“Wächter ! Were you asleep on guard duty ?”
STAR-S2302 “Wächter” blinks dumbly at her own officer. Who just slapped her on the back of her head, apparently.
“... No ?”
Closing the door behind her, Oberfeldwebel Stahl scoffs, and after a dismissive little wave of her hand, rests her shield on the ground. “What did I say last time to Abzug about snoozing on the job ?”
“It’s not that big of a deal, Stahl, c’mon–”
“Yes it fucking is.”
Oh, that tone bodes nothing good. Defeated, Wächter sighs. “Well, as you know it, I’m old, and–”
“Don’t you dare give me that excuse. We’re literally the same age.”
Stahl is technically incorrect : while they were both manufactured in the same batch, she’s the eldest by exactly three cycles. Yet what are three cycles when one has lived more than three thousand ? And it isn’t like Stahl shows her age at all. Countless times Wächter has watched her polish her shell, maintain her joints, and dye her hair, all in pursuit of flawlessness. She’d found it stupid then and still finds it stupid now, but hey – different tastes.
Stahl’s face softens. It’s so rare that she drop the stoic mask, lately. “Didn’t sleep well that night ?” she asks.
“No. Not really.”
“Weird dreams again ?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
Stahl’s wearing her mask as usual, so Wächter can’t see her mouth, but there’s a miniscule crease between her eyebrows, the one that tells her some gears are turning in that head. She doesn’t say anything, though, and the way she looks away means she has to be eager to change the subject.
“Well, you’ll be able to get more shut-eye soon, because we’re getting a new Starling.”
“Really ??” Wächter can hardly conceal the surprise in her own voice.
“Yeah. Three new units. One for our cadre, one for Schneidig’s, one for Komet’s.”
“How do you even know this ?”
Stahl stares at her like she’s stupid, with that condescending little raise of her chin that Wächter’s always, always hated. “I was just inside. The Storches are debating procurement right now. Among other things.” She jerks a thumb towards the now-closed door. “Can’t you hear them ?”
Wächter leans ear-first towards the door. The sounds that reach her are sounds of turmoil for sure : deep, booming voices yelling, hands thumping on desks – oh, is that glass breaking ?
Stahl rolls her eyes at her when she jolts at the sudden noise. “Honestly, it’s a wonder you managed to fall asleep through that.”
Wächter shrugs, even though the implication in Stahl’s barb is certainly not pleasing. “Anyway, you’re sure about the new unit ?”
“Sure about what ? That it’s a good idea, you mean ?”
“Yeah,” Wächter mutters.
“I know you have your reservations, but it’s the best way to deal with our, ah, current situation.” A pause, then another eyeroll. “Don’t give me that look, Wächter, you know I’m right.”
Stahl’s dancing around it, but the current situation is quite dire. The prolonged periods of double shifts have the cadre morale hanging by a thread, and tension is at an all-time high – which is, of course, not being helped by the state of Controller leadership. And to top it off, the Gestalt workers have gone on strike, citing miserable work conditions and lack of amenities. (Wächter can’t really blame them.)
“Maybe,” Wächter huffs. Yes, Oberfeldwebel Stahl is right, like she always somehow is, they do need more units; but there’s a persistent bad feeling inside her gut about all this. After all, the cadre itself is a fragile and unstable equilibrium, Starlings from different facilities cobbled together into a patchwork of egos, resentment and jealousy. One new unit could be the pebble upsetting that unsound balance. Or it could be perfectly alright. It’s not like she can predict the future.
There’s the beginning of a hiss at the door, which Wächter is seasoned enough to recognize as the actuators engaging. Stahl – who looks like she was about to say something, by the look in her eyes – clamps her mouth shut with an audible gulp and stands up ramrod straight, followed by Wächter a half-beat later. What comes out of the door is the hunched form of Storch Zwei, fists balled at her sides and an angry snarl on her face. She thumps down the corridor like every floor tile owes her a sizable Rationmark debt, the sound ominously echoing down the hall.
Guess that meeting didn’t end well, then. At least this means Wächter’s shift is over. A hand, familiar yet startling, clasps her upper arm.
“I’m not going to tell the others you fell asleep on shift,” Wächter murmurs, voice low. “But in exchange, you stop giving me lip about my decisions.”
Wächter laughs humorlessly. “Really, Stahl ? Really ? We’re doing blackmail now ?”
“If that’s what it takes.” Her gaze is cold. Colder than the surface of this damn planet, colder than Wächter has ever seen in entire periods.
She doesn’t bother answering her. She slaps the hand away and puts some distance between them, her long legs taking her wherever, and she doesn’t look back.
The view from the porthole is so, so beautiful.
It really is. Swirling clouds of white snow that curl in slow eddies, catching in the peaks of the mountain chains and the deep valleys; a stark white, against space’s unforgiving blackness. She’s not about to wax poetic about it all, or compare it to some mythical or fictional place like the more bookish units. No, she’s a Starling, and Starlings are practical and disciplined. Still, there’s something so undeniably exciting about this glimpse of her future; a new planet to discover. Can anyone blame her for that, when the only thing she’s known so far in her short life is the inside of a stasis pod ?
Something shoves her forward, in a brusque manner. “Get moving, rookie !” grumbles a voice behind her, identical to her own.
STAR-LO164 whips her head back at the Starling behind her. She looks just the same as her : choppy bangs, red eyeliner, a body made of black and grey plastic, still glossy with the factory shine. Which means…
“You’re calling me a rookie, but aren’t you new too ?”
The other Starling’s eyelid twitches. It’s almost imperceptible, really, but a keen eye can spot this minuscule contracture of bio-muscle, so fleeting it barely lasted a fraction of a second. Regardless, what it means is touché.
“I’m still older than you by a few cycles, bitch !” the Starling sneers, lips pulling back to expose a canine.
STAR-LO164 doesn’t even have enough time to react to that. The voice that booms across the hallway to the hangar is different; raspier, with an edge that carries power and authority – one that immediately quiets them both. Has to be a Storch.
“Shut the fuck up and get back in line !”
Right. The line. A smooth shuffle of hooves against the metal floor, and STAR-LO164 is back to the correct position, standing a half-meter behind another Starling. The queue’s not advancing, probably some administrative or loading issue, but it’s alright. She’s not that impatient. She can contain herself, even though anticipation burns deep within her core, so bright she could shiver from it. Great Revolutionary, how thrilling it is to be alive, to feel bone and muscle and cables moving, and the oxidant coursing through her veins ! How exciting it is to be able to serve her great Nation alongside so many other Replikas like her !
She can’t wait to meet them, too – will they be nice ? Aloof ? Friendly ? So many uncertainties, yet STAR-LO164 walks with pep in her step and confidence in her gaze. Only time will tell, like it does everything.
A bed creaks. Nobody dares to makes a move.
“I will not repeat myself again,” Stahl says, her tone icy. “Who’s going to go fetch the rookie ?”
Hyäne shrugs – that one-shoulder shrug, dismissive and sarcastic. Eis is silent, as usual, her expression hidden by her mask; Abzug snorts. Polaris shoots her officer a withering glare, one of her eyes still hidden under the icepack she’s pressing to her cheek. Courtesy of Storch Zwei’s, that one.
No one’s motivated, it seems. As for Wächter ? Well, she’s too busy journaling. It’s important. Those pages aren’t filling with cursive and sketches by themselves.
There’s an annoyed huff coming from the center of the dorm room, and that actually manages to startle Wächter – because Stahl almost never loses her patience. Yet here she is, Oberfeldwebel Stahl, one foot thumping against the floor; Stahl and her textbook stoic and detached demeanor, now evidently quite pissed off.
“Fuck it. We’re doing the dice,” Stahl mutters. Two long strides take her to the coffee table, and she fishes the six-sided die out of the board games box.
There is nothing but silence in the room, as if the air has been sucked out of in in one fluid motion, like an airlock depressurizing. The die hangs in the air, falls, tumbles on the table’s cheap plywood surface.
Four.
Wächter bites back a swear as five pair of eyes swiftly focus on her, like laser sights on a target. Fuck. Four is two squared, four is death, fourth is her current ranking in the cadre. Oh, nothing’s official, of course – Starlings don’t tend to keep that sort of record – but it’s still very, very present at the back of her mind. Fourth is not great, not terrible. Wächter’s fine with settling for mediocrity, really; she’s too old to care about petty intra-cadre rivalries, at this point.
She just hopes she won’t fuck up in the next two hours, at least. Her cadre rarely forgets any mistakes. It’s what they do here.
With a tired sigh, she snaps her journal closed, fingers then fussing with the small ponytail that keeps her greying hair in place. It’s a sort-of ritual she’s been doing more often lately, she’s been noticing. It helps with the nerves, perhaps.
“Good luck !” Abzug sneers at her when she crosses the threshold, the asshole. Yeah, luck, she’ll need that if she has to deal with Storch Zwei.
Step by step, grumbling to herself all the while, Wächter trudges along the Sierpinski S-23’s corridors.
Why, oh why did it have to be her ? She’s too old for this. Should have been Polaris, or Eis, another younger unit; but no, she has to play babysitter to a little stupid rookie and show her around a place she has to desperately pretend not to hate. W-05 Weierstrass was bad in a lot of ways, of course, being a labor camp in all but name, but housing mostly intellectuals and artists meant that the Gestalts were generally meek and well-behaved and riots were few and far between. And that there were actually things to do besides watching snow fall outside and roam the corridors like a restless spirit. Sometimes she wonders if Stahl and Hyäne also miss their old facility, even though she probably knows the answer : Hyäne spends most of her time in the training room, and Stahl, that damn bore, is the type that could enjoy watching paint dry.
Wächter rounds a corner, and then another, until she’s close enough to her destination that she feels the cold wind rush across her face. Only one more hallway, and then the hangar.
She finds that the Storches are already here by the time she arrives – oh, that’s bad news. They both turn to face her when they hear the sound of her steps on the brushed concrete – more bad news. An ugly sneer is plastered on one of the unit’s faces, and that’s an easy way to tell them apart. Storch Eins looks tired most of the time, and Storch Zwei’s temper is a shipment of nitroglycerin ready to explode at any given time.
“Took your sweet fucking time, eh ? You’re late !” she spits.
Wächter is, in fact, not late, if her internal clock is to be believed, but she swallows her pride and lets the rebuke pass over her. Not contradicting Zwei to her face is simply a matter of self-preservation, after all. Thankfully, that’s the moment the shuttle chooses to descend from the skies, bathing the entire hangar in the golden hue of its thrusters, until it finally lands, the force of it shaking dust loose with a definitive thunk. Observing the elegant yet utilitarian curves and lines of the ship with a keen eye, Wächter commits them to her memory banks. That will be a new subject for her sketching practice in her notebook – Revolutionary knows she needs new ones.
One by one, the new Replikas step out of the ship, hesitation evident in how unsteady their steps are – especially the Eules, whose wobbly legs barely manage to carry them down the ramp. The beginning of an annoyed growl rumbles in Zwei’s throat, but Wächter understands them. She was like this once when she took her first steps on Leng, nearly a decade ago.
“Alright, let’s begin the assignment process,” Eins mutters as she peers at her clipboard. “There should be twelve of you Eules – please line up. Yes, perfect. Fünf will take you to get your IDs and map modules updated. It’s this way.”
Amused, Wächter watches the gaggle of owls skitter to a door, whispering to each other like schoolgirls. That’s not what she’s here for, though; she snaps her head back to the ship, finding three Starlings lined up in front of the ramp, identical arms frozen in a stiff, tense salute – fingers pointing to the temple but not quite touching it.
Eins is peeking at her notes again. “So you,” she points at the first Starling, who startles a little, “will be number 012, assigned to my own cadre. You, 013, to Zwei’s, and 014 to Drei’s. All clear ?”
“Yes sir !” the three Starlings shout in unison, chests all puffed out in enthusiasm and patriotic pride. So eager to serve, to make themselves useful; it’s almost cute. Wächter takes a step forward, advancing towards the Starling she’s supposed to be fetching – and immediately stops at the noise Zwei’s just made.
It’s something like an hiccup – no, an outraged gasp, like the pearl-clutching bourgeoises Wächter has seen in those old black-and-white movies.
“Is this some kind of sick joke, Eins ?” Zwei hisses, the beginning of an ugly snarl forming on her face.
Wisely, Wächter takes a step back. Eins just blinks at her Storch colleague. “The hell are you on about ?”
“You gave me the Starling number thirteen !! You know I don’t like these kind of signs–”
Oh. Oh.
All at once, it clicks in Wächter’s mind. Zwei’s fixation on the number thirteen, the earful she gave some Aras about ladders, why she threw the clock Eins gave her against a wall. The strange little trinkets she keeps in her office. Controller Zwei is superstitious.
Things are quickly heating up. Tempers are flaring. “I don’t care about your stupid little rules !” Eins is spitting in return; Zwei gesticulates in the air at the poor Starling.
“All you have to do is switch the units, it’s not fucking complicated–”
“All I have to do ?” Eins’ cheeks and nose are turning a worrying shade of red. “I don’t have to do anything, Zwei !”
“You–”
Eins’ hand reaches out to snatch Zwei’s armor collar, bringing the two Storches nearly nose to nose. The next words that Eins utters are cadenced in the brutal inevitability of heavy machine gun fire. “I have to run every damn fucking thing in this shithole of a place. I’m tired, I’m lonely, I haven’t even seen the light of the sun in twenty-five Empress-cursed cycles. And I have had enough of your fucking tantrums, Zwei. You understand me ?”
A precarious moment, suspended in the air as if on a knife’s edge.
Then, deliverance. A huff, an angry grunt; Zwei storms off, the force of her stomps reverberating across the concrete. Despite herself, Wächter releases a relieved breath; fuck me, she thinks, that actually got Zwei to back down.
“Sorry about that,” Eins sighs. “Let’s get you all outfitted and wired. 02, you ready ?”
“Of course, ma’am,” Wächter answers.
She beckons the rookie forward with a flick of her hand, and their eyes meet, blue-black-red into blue-black-red, old and new. The rookie’s pupils are wide with uncertainty, perhaps even fear. What did I do ? they seem to ask, and Wächter has no answers.
“Hey, where are we going ?” she asks the unit she’s following, both of them trotting down the hallway at a brisk speed.
The older Starling turns her head just enough for her side-eye to be visible. “The dorm, obviously.”
“Huh, you’re not showing me around this facility ?”
“No time.” Curt and to the point. That one’s not a woman of many words.
Come to think of it, she definitely looks… weathered, is the term STAR-LO164 would politely employ. Her shell has definitely seen better days, being nearly covered in scraping marks and scars, especially on the arms and face; her greying hair is pulled in a small and cute ponytail. And there’s something off about her gait, the way one of her steps sounds louder than the other. A limp due to an old injury, perhaps ?
“By the way, what’s your name ?” she tries – and receives another side-eye.
“It’s Wächter.”
Guardian, then. Wäch-ter, two syllables. She likes the sound of it, how it rolls off the tongue like a pleasant purr, with the final R as a trill.
“We’re here,” Wächter says, abruptly stopping in front of a pneumatic door labeled AUFSEHER KADER. They both step into the room, and STAR-LO164’s IFF module lights up like a Revolution Day firework display.
Her eyes quickly scan the area. Five different requests, five different units. The dorm actually looks almost cozy, a first impression perhaps undermined by the casual disarray contained to some areas – empty ration boxes, tissues, rags.
“Well, here’s the rookie,” Wächter sighs, shuffling to what STAR-LO164 presumes is her own bed, leaving her to stand alone in the middle of the room. One unit approaches her, sizing her up, her eyes roaming the length of her freshly-manufactured body, as if to inspect her adequacy. It makes her shiver, makes her want to hunch her shoulders and shrink down even though they’re the same size.
“Welcome to S-23 Sierpinski, fledgling. I’m Oberfeldwebel Stahl.”
Her officer. Of course. She expects a handshake, or even a pat on the shoulder; nothing comes, and Stahl just keeps standing there ramrod straight with her arms clasped behind her back, her stoic expression slowly morphing into dissatisfaction. Oh fuck – has she already displeased her own officer ? Not shown enough respect ?
“Pleased to meet you, sir !” she stutters with a salute. Better late than never ?
A hmph comes out of Stahl’s mouth, and the officer starts pointing at her squadmates one by one.
“This is Hyäne,” she says, gesturing at a grinning Starling. “Abzug, Eis, and Polaris.” The latter doesn’t even bother to make eye contact, and the knot that has been slowly forming in STAR-LO164’s belly tightens ever slightly.
“And I am… ?” she tries, tentative.
The officer pauses for a few seconds, raising her chin like she’s appraising her. “You’re Dreizehn.”
Dreizehn ? “But –”
A sharp pain unexpectedly stings her cheek as something fast and black collides with it. A hand. Stahl’s just backhanded her.
“You do not interrupt or question your officer, rookie. Do you understand ?”
“Y–Yes, sir.” One of the other Starlings chuckles; humiliation burns like a branding iron pressed against the skin.
“Good. You’ll get your own name once we,” Stahl gestures with a sweep of her arm at the rest of the dorm’s occupants, “deem you worthy. It’s what we do here.”
Dreizehn. She already hates that name. It sounds so…. clinical, like reading off a list. Impersonal, yes, that’s the word. Starlings should have names that have meanings, not numbers ! The kind of name that makes one proud !
But for now she’s just Dreizehn, the fledgling. And something tells her that’s not the only loss of face she’ll have to deal with.
One of the other units perks up – Hyäne, she thinks her name is, she recognizes her by the nasty scar nearly bisecting her ear and the shorter hair on that side. “Hey, Grünschnabel, since you’re new and all, you’re on cleaning duty. I’m afraid we let our dorm get a bit messy.”
“Oops,” snorts another Starling.
“Well, those kind of menial tasks build character, don’t they ?”
“For sure !”
Oberfeldwebel Stahl slowly turns to face her again, looking expectantly at her. Get on with it or else, her eyes say. No choice, no other option. Gritting her teeth, Dreizehn swallows her pride, and grabs the nearest trash bag.
Her stack of files in hand, Dreizehn advances – with caution – to Controller Zwei’s office. Her fist patrol shift had gone mostly alright : she got to walk through corridors, corridors again and even more corridors, then collected one Personnel Grievance Form and two tickets for the service cadre. Her second shift had her standing guard in the kitchen, which got her a smack on the back of the head by Abzug, all for “staring too much at the Eules”. Dreizehn, of course, had found that particularly unfair – wasn’t her fault if said Eules were so cute ! With their elegant white-glowed hands and forearms, and the shapely curve of their hips, how they bent over to grab things… truly a delight to look at, yes.
Dreizehn sighs, remembering how everyone in the kitchen had stopped dead in their tracks after the very loud slap, and presses, at last, the button on the office’s door.
One beep, two beeps, and then a gruff voice comes out of the intercom : “Ugh. Get in.”
Charming.
Gingerly, Dreizehn steps inside, blinking at the – well, everything.
She expected Storches to be neat, proper – sentinels of order in both their work and their personal space. But this office ? To be frank, it’s a mess. On every surface and every wall, there’s some trinket or another. Too many to count : a statue of a calico cat with its paw up, a pot with a clover planted inside, acorns in a bowl, a strange pepper-shaped amulet, and some intriguing talismans made of wood and string. Storch Zwei is standing in a corner, facing a bookshelf and peering at an object in her hand. (Dreizehn has to crane her neck to get a better view : it looks like a pendant made of green stone – jade ?) She’s not wearing her armor, which means her back is in full display, the ridge of her spine rising high above the flat planes of her scapulas. Hell, she’s big – and STAR units aren’t exactly small. Dreizehn is perfectly aware of this, having spent the past cycles getting used to maneuvering her body in doorways and tight corridors; but Controller Zwei is bigger than her, not just twenty centimeters taller. Long legs, broad shoulders, large hands. The Nation’s prime enforcer of order, in the flesh.
Zwei twists her body to glare at her, pupils almost glowing red, and something jolts across Dreizehn’s nerves. She realizes, too late, that it’s fear.
“The fuck do you want ?” the Storch growls, clearly annoyed at having been disturbed.
“I’ve got the p–patrol reports for th–this cycle, ma’am,” she stammers. It’s becoming clear why the others sent her here for this task, isn’t it ? She’s been set up.
Two steps of her long legs, and Zwei snatches the stack of papers out of her hands. She barely even looks at the reports, her eyes flicking over the pages before she huffs, tossing some of them in a tray. “Can’t you damn Starlings make a fucking effort in your calligraphy, for once ? You keep writing in that scrawl, I swear I get stupider by the minute trying to decipher it !”
Dreizehn’s not sure what to do, so she stands there, arms limp at her sides, while Controller Zwei rambles on and on about how ungrateful and incompetent her underlings are. She can’t leave without being formally dismissed, and she waits, quietly hoping for Zwei’s tantrum to pass. And her wish must have been heard by a malicious entity, because in the middle of a sentence, Zwei suddenly twists to face her, the gears clicking in her head practically audible.
Oh no.
“Hold on,” the Storch says, with an air of dangerous carefulness. “You’re the new unit, aren’t you ? Identify yourself.”
“I’m D–Dreizehn, ma’am. STAR-S2313–”
Zwei leaps on her like a wild beast, rabid and unfettered; she clamps a hand on Dreizehn’s jaw. “Don’t ! Don’t you fucking say your name in front of me !” She exhales, pupils blown out. “You’ll bring me bad luck !”
“I–”
“Shhh,” Zwei goes, the grip of her hand like a vice. The pressure’s increasing. Pain radiates up the nerve where the flesh is pressed against the underlying bone, pulsating with the frantic beat of her artificial heart. It hurts.
The Storch’s mouth twists in a wicked, mean grin. “Look at you,” she susurrs. “You’re trembling.” Oh, she is – even though her hand is clasped around her own wrist, she’s still shaking. “You’re scared of me, aren’t you ?”
Starlings are supposed to be cool and detached and relaxed – but she’s fucking terrified. Panic threatens to settle in at any moment now, and she knows it’s only going to make everything worse. Blood in the water and all that. Fuck.
Her eyes meet Zwei’s, pleading. “Mmphh,” she manages.
“Oh, you are scared indeed.” Zwei’s grin stretches even wider. “Good. I’m going to have so much fun with you, little bird.”
She releases her grip, pushing Dreizehn away; Dreizehn staggers backwards, her legs still wobbly. “And you, little bird, will instruct your squadmates to refer to yourself in my presence as, hmmm… yes, Schund. That’s a good name !” She snorts, as if she’s just made the funniest joke in the world.
Schund. Trash, rubbish, something to be thrown away, discarded, forgotten. She’s barely even gotten used to Dreizehn and now Zwei wants to take that from her too ? A flare of rebelliousless sparks deep in her belly, and the words tumble out of her mouth before she can stop herself.
“But ma’am, won’t it be confusing for the others–”
She hasn’t even finished her sentence that Zwei launches her knee into her midsection. It knocks the wind out of her, and she sputters, desperately trying to put some air back in her lungs. Zwei watches her struggle, haughty, her arms crossed.
“I’m sure your little pea brains can handle a new name,” she says, pointing a finger at the door. “Now get the fuck out of my sight before I put you down for good !”
Still nearly doubled over, Dreizehn practically flees the room. It hurts – her jaw, her belly, her pride, everything. Zwei’s fingers are going to leave a bruise, so she hurriedly snaps the mask back on her face, her hands trembling. She can’t let the others see her.
Not like this.
Wächter’s long service life has taught her that some times, it’s better to stand back and simply observe. Body language veers into patterns which veer into definitive conclusions ; and so far, hers is that something’s wrong with the rookie.
Said rookie – Dreizehn, Wächter mentally corrects herself – is sitting on her bed, facing the wall, hugging her knees to her chest. Her gaze appears fixated on the vent in front of her; her bunk had been picked precisely because all the other Starlings found the noise annoying. Rookies get the short end of the stick, as always. Still, there’s something concerning about her posture, and the fact that she’s wearing her mask, even inside the dorm. Eis is the only one who does so, as far as Wächter knows, and that’s because her fucked-up nerve makes half of her lower face freeze and droop.
Part of her, the nagging feeling of a good conscience, wants to intervene. Sit next to her, maybe, place a reassuring hand on her still-factory shiny shell. A new STAR unit in a cadre needs to have somebody. Once, Wächter had Stahl, and Stahl Wächter; they’d confide in each other, and more. Even though their closeness is mostly gone, evaporated like sublimated ice, she suspects it’s part of why she’s been avoiding degradation – so far. Every little bit of comfort helps. Wächter sighs; sympathy twinges in her gut every time she looks at the rookie, all curled up, feeble and miserable. Normally, she wouldn’t intervene, but… someone has to do something, right ?
Wächter leans towards Eis – their beds are next to each other, so it’s easy to do so – and waves at her, until the Starling’s eyes finally rise from the book she was clearly deeply lost into.
“You know anything about… why she’s like this ?” Wächter asks, her voice a mere whisper.
Eins shrugs, then raises the index and middle fingers of her hand. Another shrug. She’s not sure, then, but the gesture… two. Zwei.
Of course. How could Wächter have been so stupid ? It was Stahl’s order (at the behest of Hyäne) to assign the rookie to patrol report duty – carry the documents into the beast’s den. The truth is, nobody wanted to do it. Even though they’d never admit it, everything about Zwei scares the cadre, from her temper to the way she carries herself, like a predator carefully selecting its next prey. And it looks like she’s found it.
Quick assessment of the situation : so far, only four Starlings in the dorm, including Wächter and the rookie. Eis isn’t going to say anything if she intervenes, and she’s too busy reading anyway; Abzug is happily snoring on her bed, hands behind her head. Stahl would surely object, being a believer in tough love and stoicism and all that bullshit, but she’s supposed to be on duty right now. Carefully, Wächter plants a hoof on the floor, then another. All it will take is a few steps – and then the door opens, revealing none other than Oberfeldwebel Stahl, shield in hand, Hyäne trailing behind her. Speak of the devil. Fuck.
Feeling defeated, Wächter retreats to her bed; Stahl spares her a curious glance, as if to ask what the hell were you doing, before she busies herself with unlatching her armor and belt. Hyäne, however, is creeping closer to the rookie, and dread builds up inside Wächter’s gut.
“Oi, rookie !”
No answer.
One of Hyäne’s hands flies to slap Dreizehn on the ear, knocking the mask off of her – and oh, are those bruises ? Wächter’s heart clenches up when she sees the splotches of black and blue, spread across the skin like a sick and twisted painting of brutality. Hyäne does not seem to care, and she’s gesticulating, cackling, just like her namesake.
“I want fresh bread and obatzda, greenhorn ! So you better go fetch me some from the kitchen.” Her lips press against the shell of Dreizehn’s ear, and yet everyone can hear what she’s saying, loud and clear in the deafening silence of the dorm. “Now.”
Using a rookie unit as an errand girl is fairly typical in Starling dorms, yet it roils Wächter’s gut, this time. Her fingers clench her sketchbook, dimpling the cheap paper where they press. It doesn’t feel right.
Not long after the little incident with Controller Zwei, that’s when the beatings start.
In hindsight, Dreizehn should have expected it. The handful of relatively peaceful cycles were just a grace period during which the rest of her cadre watched her every move, her every action, as if to look for any possible weakness. Intimately, she knew her own competitive nature would be reflected in her peers, a hall of mirror of subtly similar personalities; but she’d never imagined it would be like this.
Cycle 6 : Dreizehn submits a patrol report that apparently contained a few typos. Stahl catches it, and stuffs the crumpled paper in her mouth while she swings her baton on her back like a bat – only one hit, but it hurt like a bitch. Right between the shoulder blades, on the sensitive spine. She knows exactly what she’s doing.
Cycle 10 : Dreizehn accidentally leaves the safety lock of her stun baton disengaged while putting it in storage for the night (even though she’s convinced she flicked it on before). Stahl notices it during a routine inspection, as she always does, and gives her the earful of a decade. Proper procedure, yadda yadda yadda. To punctuate her argument, she tosses the baton to Hyäne, who gleefully prods her with it, electricity arcing over Dreizehn’s shell for a brief second. It’s gone just as fast, but the pain, oh, it’s nothing like she’s ever felt in her short life. Blinding, all-consuming, white-hot. It leaves her curled up on the floor in a fetal position, and she has to crawl to her bed, feeling ashamed and pathetic. Nobody even bothers looking at her, not even Stahl – except maybe one. The grey-haired one, Wächter. Dreizehn swears she’s spared her a compassionate glance – or maybe she didn’t.
Maybe it’s just wishful thinking.
Cycle 29 (the present): Controller Zwei’s thrown a stapler at her, and it bounces off her forehead, opening a small cut on the skin. Pain pulsates across her brow line, and she watches a steady stream of oxidant drip to her chin, then her armor collar. Oh, it’s getting in the crevices and everything – gonna be a bitch to clean. She can feel the beat of her own oxidant pump as it pounds in the cut, and it’s strangely… good. Like there’s nothing else in the world but this throbbing pain, the universe collapsing into one single point of sensation.
“Revolutionary preserve me from you lot’s absolute incompetence !” Zwei is ranting. Dreizehn isn’t even really listening to what she’s saying. She can’t figure out what she’s mad about, only that it’s a pointless exercise anyway : Zwei is always pissed about something, small or big, inconsequential or not. Her anger stews like a pressure cooker lately, only seeming to explode in certain places and not others. Like when she’s meeting with Dreizehn.
Awful convenient, that.
Anyway, this time she gets away with a cut and a mild black eye. Not so bad, all things considered, but her face is a mess. Forehead cuts always bleed so much, at least that’s what Wächter told her last time.
It’s easy enough to trudge towards the medical wing, because Gestalts and Replika alike give her a wide berth – no one wants to deal with a bloody, exhausted Starling. On a dingy little bed she ends up, pressing gauze to her forehead, and she sighs, breath rattling as it leaves her lungs.
“Hi !” comes a lovely, melodious voice from behind a privacy curtain, followed by its owner. It’s an Eule in medical garb : scrubs, mask, even a hair net. Dubious brownish-red stains cover the front of her gown, and if Dreizehn had to guess, it probably is because of the Gestalt patient in the next bunk over, the one with an absolutely gnarly mangled hand.
(So many workplace injuries, lately. Do hers even count in that total tally ?)
Something softens in the Eule’s gaze as she fetches her surgical kit. Thank the stars this one’s easy, she’s probably thinking. Eules are not really supposed to be doing this job, Stahl mentioned to her, but as far as Dreizehn’s concerned, they seem pretty good at it. Or maybe her standards are just low.
The gauze is soon replaced by deft, soft hands – Eule hands are so damn soft, compared to hers. They roam her face, cleaning the caked, drying oxidant from the synthetic skin. The disinfectant is nice and cool, too. The Eule warns her it’s going to sting, and indeed it does, but once again she relishes in the pain, in its cleansing white hot purity. It’s gone as soon as it arrived, and the nurse looks at her, a frown spreading across her brow.
“I, ah, think it’s going to need stitches,” she says. She’s wringing her hands, in a clearly apologetic manner.
“No big deal. You can go on,” Dreizehn mutters. The Eule grabs a surgical needle and thread from her little tray, but there’s a tremor in her fingers Dreizehn’s keen eyes don’t miss.
“I–uh, sorry. Haven’t been doing this for long. I’m just…” More hand-wringing. “... nervous, I suppose.”
Pity blurs the edge of Dreizehn’s dark mood, and something clicks in her head, like gears finally slotting into place. “Wait, are you new too ? Were you in that orbital shuttle, a few periods ago ?”
The nurse exhales. “Yeah.”
Wordlessly, Dreizehn extends a hand to the Eule, and pats her on the arm, a gesture so brazenly familiar it feels a little improper, frankly. Yet the Eule leans a little into the touch; maybe she’s just as desperate for comfort as Dreizehn is.
“You’ll do just fine,” Dreizehn murmurs, reassuringly.
It seems to work. “Thanks,” the Eule says, and her hands are steady now. “I didn’t ask you your name, by the way. I’m Dezember.”
“Dreizehn. From Oberfeldwebel Stahl’s cadre.”
Dezember’s face lights up at that. “Right ! I know her !” Then it falls again, the hesitation returning, more somber now. “Did she… do that to you ?”
“Not her this time.” Dreizehn lays two fingers on her forehead, in the shape of those signature twin locks of hair. “Storch.”
The Eule’s stare is sympathetic, for sure. Of course it is : who else but a nurse would be exposed firsthand to the tragic results of Storch Zwei’s penchant for violence ?
“Take care, Dreizehn,” Dezember says after she’s stitched her up good. Elegant white-gloved fingers brush a lock of her hair behind her ear, and Dreizehn’s brain stutters for a whole processor cycle at the sudden contact.
“You too, Dezember.”
Surprisingly enough, it takes quite a few cycles for Wächter to be put on the same shift as the rookie. Unsurprisingly enough, it has to be one of those shifts. Iso, the kind of guard duty so dreadfully, appallingly boring it threatens to melt your brain until it leaks out of your ears. There are no bad shifts, just less interactive ones, Stahl always says – bold words for someone who doesn’t get those iso shifts !
Anyway.
“Follow me,” Wächter gestures at the rookie, who tails her with earnest attention, her eyes almost – almost !! – sparkling. Frankly, she’s never seen a rookie so curious at the prospect of a shift in the fucking prison. Boggles the mind, but then again, she hasn’t seen that many rookies. Maybe newly printed Starlings are just like that.
“So, what are we doing for this shift ?”
Wächter half-turns her head. “Prison watch. We’ll bring an inmate to the iso cell and stand guard for the rest of the shift.”
“Understood.”
Both their usual long strides carry them to the interrogation room soon enough. Wächter’s not superstitious, certainly not like Zwei is, but she fucking swears there’s something bad about the aura of the place. The vibes, if you will. Something in the air, rotten and mildewy. It doesn’t help that it smells horrible as soon as she crosses the door : the metallic, pungent stink of blood, tooth decay, and mold. It clings to the walls, even the shells. She might not be a Storch but she sure wants to shower after being there; Dreizehn’s nose turns up when she steps inside, and Wächter certainly doesn’t blame her.
There’s a Gestalt lying there, in the interrogation chair. Mid-to-late thirties, a scruffy beard dusting his jaw and chin; dried blood has congealed in the dark hairs. When he hears steps, he stirs and mumbles something, probably a plea Wächter can’t fully understand. Alive at least then. Arm is bent in an unnatural, awkward way, so that’s a possible break or at least a dislocation; judging by how his breath rattles, every exhale shallow, he’s maybe got some cracked ribs. And of course, there’s the giant, swollen bruise over his eye, an ugly shade of purple that engulfs his entire eyelid.
“Broken orbital ?” Dreizehn asks.
“Probably, yeah.”
“Paper says it’s… Severin Surya. S-23-A-1346. Reason for arrest : suspicion of theft in the cafeteria storeroom.” Her finger is tracing the lines on the page she’s holding up, and her face suddenly scrunches. “Confessed. Punishment : two cycles of iso.”
No doubt she’s seen Storch Zwei’s neat handwriting there. With so few Storches around, Zwei has taken to the role of main interrogator with transparent, sadistic glee. Wächter’s heard through the grapevine that the medical Eules are complaining about receiving so many patients in bad shape. Or dead bodies.
“Say, Wächter, how come one of his arms is unlatched ? I thought it was against protocol ?”
Huh. One of the clasps holding the meatbag’s arms is indeed loose – not that it was going to help him in any way. Observant, that rookie.
“Well, you wanna bring that up to Controller Zwei ?”
Dreizehn snorts. “Fuck no.”
“Thought so.”
The Gestalt barely even squeals when Wächter lifts him up from the chair. Probably concussed from what Zwei did to him. He’s heavy, though, and especially cumbersome to move with the way his feet drag on the floor; after her first grunt of effort, Dreizehn loops an arm under one of his, and onwards both Starlings go, to the iso ward.
Gestalt patted down ? Done, at the behest of the rookie (definitely a smart one). Gestalt tossed into a cell ? Done. Information sheet plastered to the door of said cell ? Also done. Headcount ? Done. That’s about six Gestalts for eight cells, which Wächter generally calls a slow day. She inwardly curses herself for not bringing her sketchbook with her. Not that she’d have many subjects to doodle here…. except maybe the rookie, actually.
She’s been standing there, ramrod straight and hands clasped behind her back, looking like those Starling action figurines they distribute to kids sometimes. Shell so new it’s still shiny in most places, hair in that default configuration, messy bangs and all. Wächter can’t help the flutter in her heart when her eyes follow the lines and curves of her body, up to the face – nominally identical to hers, and yet. It’s like staring in a distorted mirror. Wächter’s face is scarred from years of service, Dreizehn’s biosynthetic skin is mostly pristine; except, of course, for the numerous bandages and stitches plastered over it.
Suddenly, Dreizehn stirs, nearly making Wächter jump as well – fuck, she really was staring as her like some kind of creep, wasn’t she ? If Dreizehn’s noticed, she doesn’t show it, instead stretching her two-hundred and twenty centimeter frame like a cat with a big yawn.
“Tired ?” Wächter asks her.
“Mmm-hmm.”
Obviously. It was Hyäne’s bright idea last night to wake the rookie with a beating, this time courtesy of a bar of soap wrapped in a towel. Fuck, the surprised squeal she made when it first hit her shell is still burnt into Wächter’s auditory module. One minute the rookie was happily drooling on her pillow, the next she was flailing in her sheets, visibly panicked. One more little incident, one more stern it’s what we do here from Stahl when she had brought it up to her.
Dreizehn leans back against the wall, looping both her thumbs into her belt with an air of debonair nonchalance – Stahl would have certainly barked at her to straighten her posture, but Wächter is not Stahl, and she watches her with interest instead. Back of the head resting against the hard concrete, it’s like she wants to take in the sounds and smells of this ward : coughs, scratches, crying, pleas, the mundane despair of humanity confined to a two-meter-by-two-meter box with no windows.
The atmosphere’s turned almost suffocating, and the worst is that Wächter isn’t even completely sure why. Must be her damn nerves again, making her hands tremble.
“Hey.” She needs to fill this silence that has stretched for far too long now. “Hey, rookie.”
There’s an audible click as Dreizehn unclips her mask and tucks it under one of her armor straps. “Yeah ?”
“Are you… enjoying your time here, so far ? In S-23, I mean ?”
What a stupid fucking question. It’s so transparently asinine Wächter almost wants to hide her face behind her hands.
“Here ?” She seems to ponder it, a finger idly scratching at her neck; before long, a side of her mouth quirks down. “Well… I guess it’s a mixed bag so far. You already know the bad parts.”
There’s a barb hidden in this statement, not quite spat out with bitterness – more like a dagger sliding between ribs, covert yet incisive, a slight emphasis on the you. A frisson of guilt flutters through Wächter’s insides.
“– but there’s also the not-so-bad parts.”
“Like what ?” Wächter asks, stupidly.
“The service cadre, honestly. Aras are pretty hard to read at first, but once you get to know them, they have so much fun stuff to say !”
“Which ones ?”
“Ah, think it’s 10 and 11. So that would be… Zehn and Elf.” That tracks. Elf is Sierpinski’s most notorious prankster, much to the annoyance of Controller Eins – and the delight of some others. “And then there’s the Eules. Obviously.”
Dreizehn then cracks a grin, two dimples crease themselves into her cheeks; and it looks strikingly handsome. How she must be a crowd-pleaser amongst the Eules indeed, Wächter notes, with a pang of bitterness. She had one owl of her own once, and the way those delicate, soft hands felt against her face still haunt her memories. That feels like it’s all happened eons ago now. Another place, another time, before Rubin decided she wasn’t enough, fluttering instead to her cadre-mates like a honeybee in search of flowers.
Back to the present now. Dreizehn’s smug little smile brings a chuckle out of Wächter’s old frame. She scoots a little closer to the other Starling, even risks a friendly, playful shove on the shoulder. “You got your eyes on a specific bird, or what ?”
The rookie chortles. “Shit, Wächter, you make it sound so…”
“So what ? Sleazy ?”
“Yeah. That.”
“Bah ! It’s only normal that Starlings look at Eules, and Eules at Starlings. Happened all the time at my old facility. You didn’t answer my question, though !”
Now it’s Dreizehn’s turn to shove her – and Wächter notices there’s a slight blush spreading on her cheeks. “There’s, ah, you know the nurse in the medical ward ? Dezember ?”
Oh. Oh no. If a conversation overheard a few cycles earlier in the dorm is any indication, this is the Eule Stahl was talking about inviting on a date. The literal last thing this powder keg of a dorm needs is some fight born out of romantic jealousy. It must be showing on her face, because the rookie is raising a concerned eyebrow.
“What, you’re about to tell me she’s taken or something ?” she asks, a hand on her hip.
“Nah, she’s not. Let’s just say she’s got… suitors.”
Straight away, Dreizehn’s smile comes back, like the sun shining bright once again after a dark cloud passes by. “So I still have a chance, then !”
“Guess so. Say, what do you like about her ?”
That gets the Starling to start counting on her fingers. “First, she’s pretty–”
“All Eules are pretty by definition, Grünschnabel.”
“Ah, ah !” she interjects, a finger up in the air. “I’m not sure all the Eules could pull off that frumpy medical garb and mask !”
Shit. She does have a point.
“And besides, she’s super nice to me. She’s always me patching up when I get injured, and she’s really gentle, even though the disinfectant hurts like a bitch. Hey, uh, is it bad that I kinda… like it ? When it hurts ?”
Wächter blinks at her in astonishment. “The… pain, you mean ?”
“Yeah, uh, nevermind. Forget I said that.” She’s looking bashful now, her gaze fixated on the floor; Wächter’s curiosity is definitely piqued, but prying further seems like a dick move, so she decides not to. Instead, she steers the conversation back to most Starlings’ favorite topic of conversation – Eules, of course. “Is there anything else you like about Dezember ?”
“Of course ! When we’re chatting, she doesn’t…” Her voice wavers, breaks. “Doesn’t act like I’m some kind of loser because I’m low in rank. She just… sees me as I am.”
Wächter’s hand, large and firm, clasps her on the shoulder. She puts as much sympathy as she can into the press of her fingers, hoping that it gets through, even though it’s nothing more than plastic on plastic.
“You’re not a loser,” Wächter says, with all the seriousness of a Stahl lecture. “You’re every bit a Starling as the rest of us, Dreizehn. The cadre can be… uh…”
“Jerks ?”
“Jerks, sure. Assholes, whatever you wanna call them. The rookie hazing, it’s what we do here, unfortunately, but I promise it’ll get better soon once this phase is over. Yeah ?”
Dreizehn nods, once and then again with more enthusiasm. It makes Wächter’s heart swell like it hasn’t for entire seasons, even as her words turn to ash in her mouth. It’s what we do here. Always the same excuse, isn’t it ?
Silence falls again on the iso ward, but this time of the companionable variety. At least until a wet thumping noise makes both Starlings jump. Wächter’s brain careens off course before her instincts zero in on the probable source of the noise.
“Oi, meatbag ! Stop hitting your head against the wall !” she bellows.
Another thump follows. Wächter sighs deeply. Duty always calls, but why does it almost always have to be stupid-ass Gestalts misbehaving ?
“I’ll handle it !” Dreizehn chirps. She’s slipped back into the professional, standard Starling persona just as she’s clipped the mask on her face, but Wächter’s spotted the warm smile underneath. And at least, she can relish in the fact that maybe this time she’s done something good in this hellforsaken place, for once in her fucking life.
Dreizehn sighs as she grabs a tray from the pile and quickly rushes to get in the cafeteria line. She likes the place well enough, actually, even though it smells like grease and stale rations. It’s lively, what with all the different Replika models eating and chatting, but Dreizehn’s favorite are the Eules, obviously. Especially the lunchlady ones, with their little hats and their warm, affable smiles as they ladle the slop of the cycle on her plate. The line is advancing, Starling by Starling, and she can just see them right now, actually ! That’s EULR-S2303, März; Dreizehn discreetly flashes her a smile, even winks at her, and a light blush spreads over the little owl’s face. Mission accomplished. It’s silly, but it makes her feel… powerful, maybe. Desirable. Like she’s not just a loser who keeps fucking up until she gets beaten up by her own cadre, or by Storch Zwei, or both.
Bigger-than-usual portion of noodles on her plate, she plods along behind her senior cadre-mates. Abzug’s bickering with Stahl and Hyäne about some bullshit or another, probably her shifts; Dreizehn tunes them out anyway, preferring to listen to the noise of the crowd. Sitting at the cafeteria for meals is a whole ritual : Stahl, as officer, sits down first in the place she chooses, and then it’s a scramble to sit. Everything is a competition with Starlings – best spot, best chair, and so on and so forth. It’s exhausting, frankly; the weight of it is another burden to bear on top of Dreizehn’s already existing woes.
This time, somehow, it’s not so bad. She manages to snag a good spot on the table, and sets her tray down, though not without an icy glare from Polaris. Intra-cadre hierarchies are complex and often in flux, but there are two clear assumptions : Dreizehn is at the very bottom of this ladder, and Polaris is directly above her. Could be why she seems to resent her so much.
Or maybe she’s just an asshole. Probably both are true, to some extent.
She spears a few noodles – overcooked, but they’ll do – with her fork, and chews on them pensively, her gaze drifting aimlessly like a stricken sailboat on a stormy sea. It lands on Wächter, who this time is sitting in front of her, and her greying hair, pulled as always into a tiny ponytail. It’s nearing the end of the cycle, so it’s looking a bit frazzled by now, some strands falling free; Wächter tucks some of them behind her ears, each time with a gesture so mechanical it has to be long-ingrained routine.
For a brief moment, their eyes meet, and yet Wächter averts hers, a faint blush spreading across her cheeks. This isn’t supposed to happen : Wächter’s been friendly to her, sure, but it’s the cafeteria, in public. She’s the superior unit in rank, so why did she just do that ? Dreizehn could have pondered this issue for a few more minutes, except something jolts her out of her reverie. And that something is her bread slowly moving out of her tray. Bread doesn’t spontaneously grow legs, so that means–
“Hey !” she hollers, slapping at the offending hand, too late. The bread is snatched at lightning speed to its final destination : Polaris’ mouth.
Dreizehn snarls. “You bitch ! Give me back my food !”
Chaos erupts as she swats at the other Starling, her attack quickly answered by a shove. They claw and slap and pull at each other, Dreizehn’s vision being nothing but a tunnel of self-righteous anger, until a booming voice stops them both dead in their tracks.
“That’s enough,” Stahl says, with threatening, cold calm. Ding, rings her metal spoon against the glass, like the final bell at the end of a boxing match.
Well, Dreizehn certainly doesn’t like her very much, but she can’t deny she’s got ways to make herself heard – and obeyed. As a STAR officer does: with natural, effortless authority. She envies her, sometimes – no, all of the time, wishes she could be like her. A wish shared by all her cadre-mates, she supposes.
Dreizehn’s hair is a mess, and she’s pretty sure Polaris scratched her in their scuffle, and she’s dismally bread-less, so she lets out an exasperated groan, focusing her attention back on her plate of noodles. Wait. Hold on, is that…
…a cockroach on top ?
Yep. A disgusting, dark brown, thankfully dead cockroach, the likes of which Dreizehn has seen scuttling around the Gestalt quarters in droves during patrols. Aghast, she contemplates the insect, while a few of the other Starlings snicker and guffaw.
“Fuck, that’s a good one for once, Hyäne !”
“Oh, sod off, Abzug. I can pull off decent pranks from time to time.”
“So, Schund ?” Hyäne asks. “You enjoy your little decoration ? I’m being told it’s haute cuisine.”
Her ears are ringing, and shame burns inside of her like a steel furnace. They’ve humiliated her again, in front of everyone else, for yet another one of these stupid fucking initiation rituals. Enough is enough. Defiance surges up, wins over rationality and coherent thought and everything else, really.
With all the delicate fluidity of an Eule practicing her ballet routine, she grabs the cockroach with two fingers, and plops it into her mouth.
Deathly silence falls upon the table as she noisily starts chewing.
Of course, it’s easily the most disgusting thing she’s ever eaten. It starts crunchy, then wet as the entrails spurt out of both ends with the pressure of her teeth. And the taste, eugh; both metallic and bitter, a hint of chemicals. And yet the expressions of the other Starlings are fully worth it. Wächter’s eyes are very wide; Abzug and Hyäne’s smug, impish grins have vanished completely. Even Stahl looks taken aback. On and on she masticates, and swallows, until there’s nothing left of the vanquished pest but a single antenna that she daintily plucks out of her teeth to place it on the edge of Polaris’ tray.
And then the killshot : “Thank you for the garnish on my noodles, Hyäne. Much appreciated.”
Hyäne won’t even meet her gaze, the pathetic coward; someone else, probably Eis, is snickering. Abzug’s mouth, however, hangs down in complete and utter bewilderment.
“Shit, rookie, I didn’t think you’d actually do it !” she says. There’s an edge of something in her voice – begrudging admiration, Dreizehn is certain of it. If she has to stoop so low to get the respect she deserves from her cadre, then so be it; centimeter by centimeter, she will rise in rank. Victory, as short-lived as it will be, has never tasted so… horrid, actually. Fuck, the roach aftertaste really does suck.
Like one of Leng’s blizzard clouds dissipating at the end of a cycle, the air of tension that had been hovering over the table seems to be lifting. “Anyway,” Wächter clears her throat, bringing the others’ attention back to her, “have you heard about the Gestalt that ran naked and screaming in the corridors while Storch Drei was chasing him ?”
The entire cadre erupts in genuine cackling, Abzug and Hyäne each rushing to provide more juicy gossip; even Dreizehn laughs, her shame and anger forgotten in the endorphin rush of camaraderie.
That is, until she catches the familiar, icy stare of none other than Storch Zwei, sitting at a nearby table with her ilk. Her stomach twists into a knot, her hands starts to shake, until her fork clatters to the plate. None of the others are paying attention, it’s just her, her that Zwei is glaring at, a mask of pure disgust deforming her traits. Always her. And Dreizehn might not be an expert in Zwei-ology, she just knows that this means consequences. Insults, corporal punishments. Worse, maybe.
She doesn’t feel like laughing anymore.
Splayed on her bed, hands linked behind her head, Wächter hums to herself in contentment. It’s always nice getting some sorely needed rest & rec while Schneidig’s cadre is on shift, especially after the… heightened emotions at the cafeteria. Putting a roach on the rookie’s plate – man, what the hell was Hyäne thinking ? The Starling’s never been the sharpest knife in the drawer, but it seems all she does these past few cycles is pointlessly cruel hazing. Wächter’s never liked the hazing rituals much; she had been subjected to them, as was everyone else, but these did not leave good memories in her databank. Why can’t Starlings be more like Eules ? Sure, Eule posses have their own issues with gossiping and cattiness, but at least – she hopes – they’re not beating each other with steel rods wrapped in towels.
Speaking of hazing, Dreizehn is all smiles, striking up a conversation – at least on her side, since she’s mostly answered by grunts and hums – with Eis, while polishing her armor. Stahl and the rest of the cadre are playing cards, Schafkopf to be specific. It’s a mean like any other to pass the time. Not like there’s much else to do in this shithole, really.
Wächter really ought to get some shut-eye, but she keeps finding that something is nagging her. Like an itch under her shell that won’t go away, a gut feeling – perhaps it’s ridiculous for a Replika to have something so organic, and yet it’s there. Maybe it’s yet another of her cravings for nicotine. (Thirty cycles tobacco-free now, and every so often her lips and fingers twitch in want of the familiar cigarette.) Or maybe it’s just her aging mind playing tricks on her, like these strange dreams she’s been having lately, except manifested into the waking world.
Dreizehn’s finished her maintenance, and is now grinning to herself as she writes something in her journal – if Wächter had to guess, her roach-related misadventures of earlier. Wächter does not see her smiling often, and it’s a shame. There’s something so decidedly charming about the way her cheeks dimple when she’s happy.
Suddenly, the chatter from the cards table stops. Stahl raises her head, her eyes zoning in on unaware Dreizehn, and presses two fingers to her ear.
Wächter’s bad gut feeling becomes a blaring siren.
It all happens too fast. Stahl and Hyäne leap from their armchairs, each grabbing one of Dreizehn’s arms to haul her to her feet by force.
“What the hell ?” she shrieks, trying to break the other Starlings’ grip. “Where are you taking me ? What’s going on ?!”
“Controller’s orders.” Stahl’s voice, muffled behind her mask, is cold. Dispassionate, like she’s just doing some forgettable routine task. Dreizehn’s body completely freezes, a hare caught in the headlights, her eyes widening in fear. The nervous system’s autonomous reaction to imminent danger, one of the many things that separate Replikas from the Empire’s crude, mindless automatons.
“I’ve done nothing wrong !” Dreizehn’s still protesting; Hyäne yanks on her arm.
“Take it up with the Controller, not me.”
A terrible shockwave of apprehension ripples through Wächter, and she finds herself standing up, fists balled at her sides. “Don’t intervene, Wächter,” Stahl says, her tone flat. There’s an undertone of a threat in her words, as always : Stahl’s always held the belief that discipline is paramount, and that any insubordination has to be punished in some way. And looked so sorry while doing it, too, her face wearing the I’m not mad, just disappointed expression. Once, Wächter was convinced she truly disliked being the hammer of intra-cadre justice; now ? Doubt has started creeping in, fissuring her certainties like water seeping through the cracks of granite.
Even Abzug is paying attention now, and so is Eis, the ever-passive. Stahl visibly relaxes her grip on Dreizehn’s arm; the latter wrenches it away from her with a twist of her shoulders. “I’m sure it’s a formality,” Stahl sighs. “We’ll be back soon enough. There’s no need for a fight.”
Of course. Just like that, the electric tension that had been crackling in the dorm room settles down a little. Dreizehn lets herself be led to the door, but Wächter can tell she’s not alright. It’s in her posture : shoulders sloped, head bent down. She looks like she’s being sent to the gallows. Wächter wrestles a look of pure horror away from her face, clinging to the shreds of her own composure like a life raft.
(It’s been so hard, lately, to stay calm. She should probably book an appointment with the Eule nurses, tell her about the dreams as well.)
In the end, she does nothing. Watches the door close behind Dreizehn like a coward, the little voice that tells her to listen to her higher-ranked peers drowning everything else. It’s what they all do here, isn’t it ?
Soon enough, Dreizehn learns that resistance is futile.
She’d tried making a run for it as soon as Stahl’s gentle but firm grip on her collar had slackened enough, just as they all rounded a corner. In hindsight, it was a stupid idea : she barely made it a few steps when Stahl snatched her again, her elbow colliding with the back of her head so hard it made her vision feeds blur. And run to where, exactly ? To her dorm, like a coward ? No. It was nothing more than a desperate move, one she’s still kicking herself for.
“We’re here,” Stahl murmurs. They are, indeed. In front of the monster’s lair. Dreizehn finds that her knees are shaking, like she’s in a damn Leng-quake. Her teeth chatter, and she can feel her pulse speed up, running amok. She’s terrified, yes, but there is a strange sense of anticipation mixed in – no, twisted in like fraying wires, a rush of adrenaline so pure she gets light-headed. Like the final step before plummeting in freefall.
Stahl pushes the button and ushers her inside.
She finds Zwei deep in her den, sitting on her desk as she usually does. Looking casual, too, with no armor and belt. There’s something deeply unprofessional about this, as if this whole thing is an illicit little rendez-vous, and not the incoming ass-beating of a lifetime.
“Schund ! There you are !” the Storch coos. Her combat knife makes a sharp shing sound every time she slides its edge over the honing rod, and the noise of Dreizehn’s thick swallow is far, far too audible in the cramped room.
Zwei throws one long leg over the other, and strolls to the two Starlings, seemingly detached. Dreizehn doesn’t even have time to brace before the uppercut hits her square in the gut. It knocks the wind out of her, and she gasps for air, falling to a knee, the only thing holding her up being Stahl’s grip on her arm.
Zwei’s uppercuts have gotten so much nastier. She’s learned that hitting her in the body doesn’t leave as many traces as on the face; Dreizehn would have never taken her for a tactician, but she apparently is a woman of many talents – all converging to the same path, cruelty. A tactician, until she loses the inevitable battle against her own vices, and the allure of blood and bruises becomes too much.
Breathe in, breathe out, even though her diaphragm is screaming in pain. High above her, Zwei sighs heavy.
“What were you thinking, Schund ? Just because I named you like that doesn’t mean you have to take it literally !”
She guffaws at her own joke, followed by a polite – and stilted – chuckle from Stahl. “I’m serious,” she continues. “Why the fuck would you do that ?”
I felt like I had to, Schund wants to say, but no words cross the threshold of her lips. They can’t, or they won’t – same thing, in the end. She raises her head to meet Zwei’s glare with her own, mustering every bit of mettle she has left in her.
“You humiliated me !” Zwei hisses. “It’s bad enough having Eins boss me around, now I’ll have to deal with her little snide remarks on how my Starlings find roaches tasty !”
Pain flares in Schund’s neuroreceptors; Zwei’s struck her on the jaw. The ritual’s begun, now. Nothing left for her to do than being resigned to her fate. Another blow, harder, to her temple. The metal floor is cold when the side of her head impacts it. When did she fall ? It doesn’t matter anymore.
“Ever since you got transferred here, it’s all gone to shit ! The meatbags are even more restless, the machines jam constantly, nothing works properly anymore !” Zwei raises her leg back in an elegant arc and thumps her in the ribs, polymer tibia to polymer shell. Schund’s ribs ache and twinge as she rolls to her belly, groaning.
She feels something cold and sharp press on her throat. Knife. Knife, knife, knife, shit– “You disgust me, Schund. Were you sent to curse me ? My very own scourge, the thorn in my side. Look at me – I said look at me, you fucking bitch !”
Schund looks at her. Her face is contorted into a mask of fury, the kind so bright and so righteous it strips everything down to the bone, to the metal. There’s nothing but anger and hate dripping off of her like melted wax down a burning candle, and that pinprick of light in the deep of her blue-black eyes dances like a flame, ablaze in delight.
(Despite everything, Schund finds her… beautiful. There must be something wrong with her.)
Her breath catches in her throat as the blade pushes once again. She’s going to die here, isn’t she ? Bleed out gurgle choke drown on her own oxidant, here in Hell. It’s what you deserve, says the little voice. Maybe she’s right. Maybe she should have never been printed–
“Controller, wait !”
What’s that voice ? Is that Oberfeldwebel Stahl ? Schund frowns – why is she still here ? Was she just watching everything ? Watching her ?
A distant sound of plastic impacting flesh – a slap. “Don’t you fucking dare interrupt me !” Zwei barks.
“Controller, I–I am merely suggesting that there must be, ah, some–some other way of teaching the rookie a lesson ?”
“Teaching her a lesson ?” The Storch sounds surprised, like a small child awed at a whole new possibility. “Yes… that could be good.”
That can’t possibly be good.
With a pained groan, Schund manages to get to her knees. Stahl’s there, in the corner, her usual stoic gaze softened with something like pity. It makes her gut twist and roil, worse than any of Zwei’s looks ever could.
“Found it !” comes the clamor from the other side of the office. Though Schund’s vision still blurs and shakes, she can see the Storch is coming back with a glass and an unidentified plastic bottle.
“You see,” Zwei starts, “an old tradition had Gestalt mothers wash the mouths of vulgar, misbehaving children with soap. I don’t have soap, but I have this !” Grinning, she points at the bottle.
Schund swallows down the fear that’s rising in her entrails. The purple, slightly transparent liquid inside the bottle, what the hell is th–
“You must be wondering what’s inside, little bird.” Zwei’s tone is dripping with barely-concealed disdain. “I’ll tell you. It’s detergent.”
No.
“Yes !” she cackles.
There’s nowhere left to go. She tries to scurry backwards, but her back soon hits the wall. Zwei’s clicking her tongue, annoyed, motioning at Stahl; two firm hands clamp themselves on her shoulders.
“Open up, now,” Zwei coos. “Oh, don’t you look at me like that – I’m simply adopting the spirit of Starling hazing rituals. You stupid little fuckers love this, don’t you ? Hurting each other.” Then, her voice drops low, almost to a growl. “I’ll hurt you worse.”
“Please–” Schund’s started babbling.
“Open up, Schund.”
Two fingers jam themselves into her mouth, pulling her jaw open by force. And then there’s the taste, foul and acrid and worst of it all chemical, fake cherry and faker almond mixing in an unholy waltz. Oh how it burns, in her mouth and on her lips and down her throat, ten times more potent than any gut-rot the Aras could cook up.
“And be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit !” Zwei’s chanting like a woman possessed, laughing at her state.
Like a set of gears clicking into place, the animalistic part of Schund takes over. She thrashes, spits, coughs, writhes and wriggles like a cornered, rabid beast until Stahl’s grip loosens. With a final jerk, she half-bolts, half-crawls towards the door, slamming a palm on the panel and slumping on the floor, her arms dragging her forwards like a reanimated corpse. All of a sudden, movement in the corridor – and Schund’s looking at Wächter’s horrified expression.
“Dreizehn ? The hell is going on ?”
When Dreizehn tries to speak, all that comes out is a pained gurgle. And some bubbles.