Liberty and Death: Chapter 56
C’mon, Casanova, one good line, one good hit, take this dickhead down, Cora coached herself.
That, however, was easier said than done.
Even without the spider-limbs, Dylan would have been a capable combatant, definitely test-tube skill without experience, but shit, Cora had been the same way less than a week ago. With the power armor, spider limbs, and a [Dex] that must be somewhere near her own, even with Jane’s boost, he was closer to ‘unbeatable’ than Cora was comfortable with.
His spider limbs moved at dizzying speed, and even when Cora was able to deal with them, she still had to contend with the blade on his arm. If it were one or the other, Cora thought she’d be able to win, but with both…?
Dylan’s offhand clipped her chin, and Cora barely parried a spider-limb thrusting up towards her heart. That hit had been the slightest of glancing blows, and it still left her head ringing.
‘Wish I could help more,’ Jane said, ‘but quips we’re never my thing.’
Yeah, I know… maybe you can though.
‘How?’
Let me be more you.
‘Slippery slope, Cora.’
You’re already me, right?
‘How sure of that are you?’
A botched block, and Cora slammed into the dirt, rolling frantically to avoid the rest of the spider-limbs trying to pin her to the street. This was untenable. She leapt to her feet, falling into Jane’s iconic combat stance.
TAKE THE FUCKING REINS JANE!
Cora came back to herself, one of Dylan’s limbs sparking on the ground in front of her, his arm pulled back and locked under her armpit. Her free hand held her gun to his armored temple.
“Shoulda stayed home, rich boy,” she said, in a voice only half her own, and pulled the trigger.
NAILED IT! +1000%!!!!
The enhanced bullet tore through his armor, and the psycho-noble scion went limp. The bubble of darkness they’d been trapped in dissipated, while Cora mag dumped into the wound, just making 100% sure.
She scanned the street as she did, but the single remaining house guard hadn’t been a match for five pissed off Luxholme Banféinní. His armor joints burned from the inside as Kyra’s {Burn You Down} finished its grim work.
“Damn, you killed a Scion, Cora?” Fern asked, lowering the rifle she’d had ready to, apparently, open up on Cora’s killer with. “Thought you were a goner for sure, when he pulled you in with whatever that skill was.”
“I, uh, yeah…” Cora shook herself, still a little disoriented from winning a fight she hadn’t been present for the second half of. “I guess I did.”
Thanks Jane.
‘Careful, Casanova.’
[INCOMING SUPPORT CHAT REQUEST FROM <MICHEAL WONIK>]
[ACCEPT?]
Yeah.
M: Cora?
M: [BS] told Lux you all got caught up with an Ultspire???
M: get the FUCK out of there!
C: no worries mike, we, uh, we took care of em.
M: what do you mean, ‘took care of them’?
C: i mean I’m watching Kyra peel this noble asshole like a grape
M: you KILLED a Scion!?
C: hell yeah, high five when we get back?
M: NO you fool! Gods, Cora, remember when I told you killing Eldridge would be bad!?
M: this is FAR worse!
C: he killed Renly, Mike. I’m not sure Polly is gonna make it either.
M: oh
M: get his body OUT of there
M: the Ultspire CANNOT know you did this
C: roger roger
“Alright folks, move now, grieve later,” Cora said, walking over to pat Emma on the shoulder, where she knelt over her sister Renly’s corpse, still impaled on a spider limb. “We gotta make sure no more of us eat it because of this. Kyra, grab Polly, get her to Jocasta fast as you can, the rest of you, start ripping!”
Most of the women snapped into action, Kyra sprinting off towards Luxholme with their wounded compatriot, the rest descending on Dylan or the burning guard. Emma, however, didn’t move. Cora sighed, and knelt next to her.
Her alter egos closed in as she focused her aura, letting it cover just the two of them, pouring as much comfort into it as she could. Comfort, and a promise of vengeance.
“Don’t let it be for nothing, Emma,” Cora said. “Renly didn’t want things to end this way, and she wouldn’t want for this to be the way things end for you either. We’ll kill every single motherfucker who shares a drop of blood with the dickhead who did this, I promise you.”
The sisters were still more or less strangers to Cora. One of them always would be now. While she’d taken the time to at least learn the names of everyone staying in Luxholme over the last few days, it didn’t mean she’d had time to forge actual connections with them. When Emma tore her eyes from her sister’s corpse long enough to look up at Cora, it was a look she’d already seen too often since she woke up in Tyrinno. Rage, loss, and sorrow so deep it threatened to consume everything.
For once, it wasn’t directed at her.
Emma nodded, and pulled herself to her feet. She began yanking at Renly’s body, and Cora helped her pull her sister off of the weapon that had killed her. Emma hefted the woman onto her back, and began trudging off towards Luxholme after Kyra.
Cora cursed, and began to assist with the effort of stripping Dylan. At some point, one of them must have hit a release latch, because the armor just kind of unfolded off of the guy. Cora grabbed it, and shoved it into her pocket dimension, with express instructions it stay there. {Harvester} showed her a few choice boy bits inside the noble dickhead, so while her girls scavenged from the guard, Cora started yoinking.
Huh, this must be what a Nano-stitch looks like, she thought, pulling a metallic casing off Dylan’s heart that swirled with silver. There were also a pair of unnatural glands in his neck, and an artificial metal vertebrae, which she snapped out and stored in a microsome.
“Ysna?” She called to the woman with the Gerblin shaman’s [Pyroteckstick] staff strapped to her back. “Could use some of that fire. No trace of this guy.”
The System had a real knack for assigning people classes that suited their personalities. Which was why Ysna’s [Pyromaniac] class was so concerning. If it wasn’t so goddamn useful, Cora would have kicked her out the first time Lux caught her trying to set fire to some bedsheets in the barracks. Instead, given that fireballs were an extremely useful combat ability, she’d just purchased Lux a fire suppression upgrade, which was relatively cheap and the house could also use to spritz Ysna when she acted up.
With a few passes of the woman’s blazing staff, there was nothing left of Dylan Hantz but ash, and any gore hanging off the bits Cora had pulled out of him.
“Good work,” Cora said, to Ysna’s disconcerting grin, “alright, let's move out! Don’t want Emma walking home alone!”
Mike met Cora at the gates, visibly stressed, as was apparently just his way now that he’d dropped the hyper-composed butler act.
“Who was he?” Mike asked, following Cora to the office.
“Dylan Hantz,” Cora said, pouring them both a measure of whiskey. They’d run out of the pisswater brandy last night, only for a tipsy Iain to volunteer his stash of Logacian 14-year, which was so much more palatable Cora had switched decanters. It only felt respectful to keep it entirely separate from the shit Linnaeus had drank. “System said he was a [Baron].”
Mike sighed dejectedly, but it wasn’t his sky-is-falling sigh, so Cora took heart.
“Baron, eh? And not a family I’ve heard of. Could be worse, I suppose. That’s only one level above you, politically speaking. I suppose that’s why you survived, if you’d run into anyone higher up I doubt you would have been able to overcome their tech,” Mike said.
“He had levels too, [Level 9 Duelist (U)], so higher than me,” Cora continued, which Mike took in stride.
“We’d been expecting that, right? That [System Integration] would be more common among the higher ups?” He said.
“Yeah, just not something I’m happy to be right about. But if a shitbird like Eldridge had them, seems only right someone more fortunate than him would,” Cora sighed.
“Explains those ghastly hunting parties, too,” Mike said. “We’re all just labor or Shimmer to those in the Ultspire, and it seems they don’t care much which.”
“Till tonight!” Cora said, winking at Mike and raising her glass, wiggling it in a cheeky toast. Despite himself, Mike’s moustache twitched up, and he returned the toast.
“Until tonight,” he echoed. “What did you do with the body?”
“Had Ysna burn it,” Cora explained. “All his tech is in my inventory, with instructions given to Jocasta not to take it out.”
“Good, good….” Mike muttered, withdrawing as the gears began to turn. Cora gave him a minute, no point trying to rush him in getting where he was going. “Yes, provided there were no survivors, I think we may be good. Surveillance in Light’s Fall is kept purposefully low, and while I expect ACABB or god-forbid, Ultforza to make some inquiries, they are unlikely to lead directly back to us… though they may not need to. I suggest you use your upcoming ‘date’ with Lord Parnassus to get a feel of the atmosphere among the gentry, see how much of a hint they have that things are awry at Luxholme.”
“Uuugghhhhhhhhhhh I don’t wwwaaaaannnnaaaaaa!” Cora groaned, but flashed a savage grin to Mike. “You promise there is gonna be a time when we can stop worrying about just killing em all, right?”
“If we play our fucking cards right, Cora!” Mike exclaimed, “good gods, I’ve known you for less than a week, but I can already tell Hawk’s been a bad influence on you.”
“Oh, right, speaking of Hawk….”