Write Your Own Ticket
May’s head rang. The guards who had come to drag her out of her cell had given her a tap on the head to keep her quiet while they put the cuffs on her, and the aftereffects lingered a little bit.
She could still feel where on their temple they had hit her as they hauled her into the dark interrogation room and dumped her on the floor.
She looked up at them. Standard Atlesian armour was grey, with a variety of coloured facings depending on what branch you were with – red, blue, green, yellow. Mantle command troopers wore black armour, with red facings across the board. That was how you could tell the difference between the soldiers deployed on temporary assignment and the real watchdogs.
Sometimes, she thought it was like they were taunting the whole of Mantle with the obviousness of their malice.
The guards’ helmets, as black as everything else about their uniforms, concealed their upper faces from view but didn’t conceal the sneers of contempt upon their mouths.
“You Mantle scum,” one of them sneered at her, down on the floor at his feet.
May flipped him off, which earned her a kick to the ribs. A wince of pain escaped her mouth as she curled up in a ball, hugging herself.
“That’s enough,” the voice that echoed in the chamber was firm, female, slightly husky… and familiar to May’s ears.
Her. Of course it’s her.
I should have known this was coming.
May opened her eyes to see a young woman standing in the doorway. She was silhouetted, the light coming in from the corridor beyond making it hard to see her features, but the height and build were enough, combined with the voice, to leave no doubt in May’s mind that it was Gia Smoketree.
“Leave us,” Gia demanded.
“But ma’am-”
“Get out!” Gia snarled. The guards beat a hasty retreat, their rapid footfalls echoing on the floor. The door closed behind them with a hiss.
The door closed behind Gia too as she walked further into the interrogation room. Her footsteps, unlike those of the guards, were slow and measured. As the door shut and the excess light was purged from the room, May could see Gia more clearly than she had before.
Gia Smoketree was a woman of May’s own age, tall – the tallest girl in their class, coming in over six feet in her habitual heels – and voluptuous, with an hourglass figure that filled out her uniform in all the right places. She was dressed all in black, wearing a leather jacket – open at the breast, revealing the dark grey shirt and black tie beneath – with pauldrons on her shoulders and studded vambraces on her wrists; her skirt did not extend very far, leaving a patch of bare leg before her long dark stockings, which disappeared into her high, and high-heeled, black boots. She wore a dust arming sword at her hip. Her hair was long and dark and fell in waves down her back and on either side of her face. Her features were sharp, with high cheekbones and full lips painted in a pale shade of pink. Her eyes were like coals and accentuated with wings of smoky eyeshadow so that it seemed the coals were beginning to burn within the fire.
She was – she had always been – one of the most beautiful things that May had ever seen.
She was the last person in Remnant May wanted to see.
“Gia,” she said softly.
Gia stood over her, casting her shadow over May. She smirked. “How far you have fallen, May,” she mused. She held out one black-gloved hand. “Let me give you a hand up.”
May hesitated for a moment, then held out both her shackled hands, letting Gia grab one of them and use it to pull May up onto her feet.
“Did they hurt you?” she asked.
“No more than you’d expect,” May muttered.
“I’ll have them disciplined,” Gia promised.
“You can do that?” May asked.
Gia snorted. “Can I? Who do you think you’re talking to, May? Who do you think I am?”
“Gia Smoketree,” May said. “My old Atlas partner.”
“Oh, I’m so much more than that now, May,” Gia informed her. “You are looking at Captain Gia Smoketree, adjutant to Brigadier General Reeve who is, as I’m sure an outlaw knows full well-”
“Officer commanding the Mantle garrison,” May said.
Gia grinned. “Do you have her picture on a wall somewhere that you use for target practice?”
“We’re not cartoon bad guys, Gia,” May huffed.
“Some of your actions might say otherwise,” Gia replied. “The point is that I’m not just your old academy partner any more, May. I’m the coming girl.” She twirled in place, arms spread out on either side of her. “The rising star of the Atlesian forces.”
“I thought that was Blake Belladonna,” May muttered.
Irritation flashed across Gia’s face. “The Warrior Princess of Menagerie is a curiosity, nothing more. She’ll be forgotten in a few months’ time, when everyone moves on to… the next movie in the X-Ray Cinematic Universe. Whatever ambitions she might have will founder on the fact that she doesn’t have the connections and support that I do.”
“She’s got General Ironwood,” May pointed out.
“General Ironwood isn’t going to be around forever,” Gia said in answer. “And those who rely exclusively on him for their advancement are going to be disappointed.”
“Whereas you-”
“Am very highly regarded across many quarters,” Gia informed her.
“Lucky you,” May said. “Did you have your goons drag me down here just so you could tell me that?”
Gia placed one hand upon the hilt of her sword. “This sword was made for me by Scarlatina,” he said. “Personally, fitted to my hand, my height, everything.”
“I thought it looked new,” May murmured. When they’d been at school, Gia had used a cheap mass production sword.
“I have a penthouse apartment here in Mantle, above the smog layer,” Gia informed her. “And another in Atlas itself where I stay whenever I have leave. I drive the latest Raptor to work every morning.”
“I don’t think you can afford all that on a captain’s salary,” May remarked. Unlike her, Gia hadn’t come from an incredibly wealthy family; she’d had to work for everything she had.
Until now, anyway.
Gia grinned. “There are all kinds of ways that an enterprising and intelligent young officer in the Mantle garrison can make money.” She paused. “This could have been you, May; this could have been us. Partners… and maybe more.”
May ignored that last part. “What do you want, Gia? To gloat that you're rich and I’m in a cell?”
“May,” Gia tutted reproachfully, “you think that I’d haul you down here just to gloat? I mean, it wouldn’t kill you to act a little impressed-”
“What do you want, Gia?” May snapped.
“I want to get you out of here,” Gia said, softly and earnestly.
May blinked. “You… what?”
“Just what I said,” Gia told her. “You and me walk out of here together. Out of this room, out of this building-”
“You can’t do that.”
“Haven’t you been listening? I’m the golden girl; I can do whatever I want. If I ask General Reeve for a favour, she won’t deny me.”
“And then what?” May demanded. “You’re just going to let me go?”
Gia stepped closer to her, forcing May to retreat before her. “Henry asked after you, the last time we spoke,” she told May. “I’m not sure how much he understands that we’re on opposite sides. I’m not sure he gets the situation between us, that we can’t just meet up for drinks. But all the same, he asked after you. He’s worried about you.”
May frowned. “You… you’ve spoken to Henry.”
“Just because you left your family didn’t mean I stopped being a family friend,” Gia said. She took a step forward, and May retreated another step. “I don’t get around for dinner as often as I used to, for obvious reasons, but I’m still well-acquainted with your family. In fact, I owe my present position in part to the patronage of your parents, who recommended me to General Reeve. So you see, if I ask to have you released, I really won’t be refused.” She stepped closer. “I’ve spoken to your parents too. They miss you as much as your brother-”
“My parents never gave a damn about me!” May cried.
“They made mistakes,” Gia said, “and they admit that, and they want to make amends. They want to make things right; they miss you, May. We all miss you. Come with me. Let me get you out of here. Let me take you home-”
“'Home'?” May repeated. “Is that what this is about, I exchange a cell here for a cage in Atlas? And what do you get out of all this? Is this all just to please and impress my parents?”
“It’s a reason,” Gia said as she advanced two more steps and forced May almost up against the wall. “But not the main reason.”
“Then what is?” May asked, fearing that she knew the answer already.
Gia leaned forwards. Her eyes, with their smoky eyeshadow, loomed very large in May’s vision. “You know what I want,” she whispered. “What I’ve always wanted. I want y-”
May hit her across the face with both her shackled hands, hitting Gia so hard that her face twisted sideways, her immaculately curled hair knocked askew.
“No!” May yelled. “No! What, did you think that you could walk in here and tell me about how wealthy you are, how successful, and I would change my mind? Did you think that I’d be desperate-”
“'Desperate'?” Gia snarled, grabbing May by the collar and pushing her backwards into the wall. “Is that what you think, still? That you’d have to be desperate to look at me that way?”
“That’s not what I meant,” May said quickly, the words rattling out of her mouth.
“I am no longer some nobody from Mantle begging for a glance from a Marigold!” Gia yelled. “I am a career officer with glittering prospects! I am the one who many would think desperate to even look at you! You ought to be flattered by my attentions, you ungrateful-”
“I’m sorry!” May cried, hunching her body, trying to turn away from her, raising her arms to shield herself. “I’m sorry, please. Please, Gia, I… I didn’t mean it like that.”
Gia’s eyes widened. “May…” She let go, taking a step backwards. “May, there’s no need to… I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you; I… I would never hurt you, you know that, right?”
You already did. May was silent for a moment. “I think I’d like to go back to my cell now.”
Gia frowned, but after a little hesitation, she nodded. “That… fine. We can talk again another time. You can think about what I said.”
I don’t need to think about it, May thought; Atlas wasn’t her home anymore. Mantle was her home, the Happy Huntresses were her home… but she didn’t say that to Gia.
She didn’t dare.
“Guards!” Gia yelled.
The door opened, and the two guards re-entered the room.
“Take… take the prisoner back to her cell,” Gia commanded. “And if I find out that you’ve harmed her in any way, you will both answer to me, do I make myself clear?”
“Yes, ma’am!” of the soldiers barked, and May noticed that their grip on her was less painfully firm than it had been; they were more gentle as they steered her than they had been, and all their actions showed they were genuinely afraid of Gia’s retribution.
May could hardly say she blamed them.
Gia Smoketree remained in the interrogation room, after the guards had taken May away.
For a moment, alone in the dimly lit room, she was still and silent, and to all outward appearances, she was calm itself.
Then she turned and, with a cry of anger, struck the wall with one gloved fist so hard that the metal tile crumpled and dented beneath her blow.
Her scroll rang. Gia scowled, but the scowl disappeared from her face as soon as she got out the device and saw that it was no less than Brigadier General Reeve herself on the line.
It would not do to greet her commanding officer and patron with a face like thunder, so Gia plastered a smile upon it and straightened out her slightly dishevelled hair and answered with a pleasant tone of voice. “Yes, ma’am?”
“Come to my office,” Reeve said. “Immediately.”
Gia clicked her heels together as she stood to attention. “At once, ma’am.”
Brigadier General Alana Reeve was a woman in her late middle years, about contemporary with Cinch herself. Grey hairs were creeping in at the edges of her dark hair, which she wore loose down to about her shoulders. She had never been particularly tall, but she had been an athletic woman once; sadly, a comfortable desk job had begun to take its toll, and her body was straining against the limits of her clothing, which looked to be a variation on a brigadier general’s uniform, in black instead of the usual white. She had lost a tooth in a skirmish some time ago, and a gold tooth gleamed prominently in her face in place of it.
She did not get up as Cinch entered the room, although she did smile, and her tone was jovial as she said, “Abacus! What brings you down from the high heavens to bestow your presence upon us?”
“General,” Cinch murmured.
Reeve scoffed. “Abacus, please, how long have we been friends? No need to stand on ceremony!” She popped a chip into her mouth. “Alana will do fine.”
“Very well, Alana,” Cinch replied. “You needn’t sound like it’s so unusual for me to descend from Atlas. I do spend most of my time in Crystal City, after all.”
“Another glittering realm, in its own way,” Reeve declared. “Coming to Mantle is quite different altogether. We’re not used to the attentions of officers from such rarefied locales, are we, Smoketree? Oh, do you know my adjutant, Gia Smoketree?”
Cinch glanced at the black-clad woman standing against the wall at the back of Reeve’s office. “Indeed, Smoketree is one of mine, aren’t you, Smoketree?”
Smoketree bowed her head. “I had the honour of your instruction, Principal, yes.”
A scholarship girl, if I recall, Cinch thought. She didn’t mention it – some alumni preferred not to have such details bruited about, although personally, Cinch felt there was nothing to be ashamed of there; quite the opposite, in fact; it was her experience that the scholarship students tended to work twice as hard as those who came from more established backgrounds. They were driven, hungry for success… they had that edge of desperation to them that enabled them to succeed, no matter who or what they had to trample over to get it. They were, in short, models for the values that had made Atlas great and the values that Atlas would need to regain in order to assure its greatness.
Smoketree added, “I asked Principal Cinch her advice before taking this appointment; she was good enough to reply, counselling me that this would be an excellent post to develop my career.”
“If an alumni comes seeking my wisdom, I will always be most happy to oblige,” Cinch said.
“Ah, so I have you to thank in part?” Reeve said. “Well, I’m much obliged. Best adjutant I’ve ever had. Although I doubt she’s that pleased with you at the moment, are you, Smoketree?”
Smoketree’s expression was inscrutable. “I’ve no idea what you mean, ma’am.”
Reeve laughed. “Smoketree,” she declared, “had hoped to capture Robyn Hill herself.”
“I’m just glad a dangerous criminal is off the streets,” Smoketree said.
“Oh, don’t give us that crap!” Reeve snapped. “Who do you think you’re talking to? Are you afraid the Principal will find out that you’re ambitious? I thought you’d been to her school?”
Cinch folded her arms. “You hoped for the glory of capturing Robyn Hill? I don’t blame you; it would have been a feather in your cap-”
“A feather that instead will be worn by Blake Belladonna,” Smoketree said, unable to keep the bitterness out of her voice. “At the risk of sounding petulant, ma’am, you could have involved me in the operation instead of some outsider who has never set foot in Crystal Prep before! I could have defeated Robyn as easily as she did!”
“That presumes that you would have gotten within a mile of Robyn Hill,” Cinch replied calmly. “I understand that you may feel betrayed by me, but perhaps you should look closer to home for the real traitor. If I had involved you, or anyone in the Mantle garrison, in the operation, I doubt that Robyn or her huntresses would have sprung the trap.”
Reeve leaned back in her seat. “You think someone in headquarters is passing information to Hill?”
“Considering the ease with which she eludes your forces, it seems the logical explanation,” Cinch said. “That was why I used only Shadowbolts with no connection to Mantle HQ.”
“And Belladonna,” Smoketree muttered.
“And Belladonna,” Cinch agreed. “I confess I wanted to see what she was made of.”
Smoketree snorted. “And what is she made of?”
“Considerable strength, clearly,” Cinch said. “But I’ll need to debrief my team to find out more.”
“Is that why you’re here, to debrief your little girls?” Reeve asked, devouring a chicken leg as she spoke. “Because if so, pass on my congratulations to them. Smoketree’s injured pride aside, they did damn well to pluck that thorn out of my side. That bitch has been a problem for far too long. Prison is too good for her. I’d like to pluck out her heart with a spoon.”
Smoketree frowned. “Why a spoon?”
Reeve rolled her eyes. “Because it’s blunt, you idiot, it will hurt more.” To Cinch, she added, “I see you don’t teach much imagination at your school.”
“We prefer discipline to creativity,” Cinch replied dryly. “But as it happens, I’m not only here to speak to my students.” She paused. “I’m here to ask you to release Robyn Hill and her associates, if certain conditions are met, of course.”
For a moment, she thought that Reeve might choke on her chicken. Her eyes bulged, and her face reddened. “You want what?”
“I want you to let Robyn Hill go,” Cinch repeated. “I expect she will request the release of her partners in crime.”
“I heard you the first time; I just didn’t believe it!” Reeve shouted. “Bloody hell, Abacus! First you run your operation in the dark, here in my kingdom, but I allow it, because we’re such old friends and because your impertinence has delivered something that, I admit, my own people have been unable to deliver. But now-”
“Alana-”
“You do not get to come into my kingdom and act like king of the jungle!” Reeve yelled.
“That was not my intent,” Cinch said, keeping her own voice calm and soft. “Will you at least hear me out?”
Reeve glared at her for a moment. “It’d better be a damn good reason,” she muttered. “That woman has it in for me, and you want me to put her back on the street?”
Cinch glanced at Smoketree. “This discussion might be better off private,” she said. “It concerns matters of high level politics.”
“If you mean your attempt – rather forlorn-looking now, I must say – to put Jacques Schnee on the Council, then Smoketree is well aware,” Reeve said.
Cinch raised one eyebrow. “Really?”
“What’s the point of you plotting to bring about a renewed, young and vigorous Atlas,” Reeve said, putting an almost mocking emphasis on 'young and vigorous,' “if you don’t trust anyone young and vigorous to assist.”
“You may rest assured, I am behind your efforts absolutely, ma’am,” Smoketree said. “Atlas has become soft, and that softness will make us vulnerable if we allow the rot to spread further.”
“I’m glad to hear that you feel that way,” Cinch replied. Or at least I would, if I could believe it. After all, General Reeve was hardly an example warning against the perils of softness. She and Cinch might be old acquaintances, but Cinch was under no illusions as to any ideological alignment between the two of them. Reeve sought greater prominence that would allow her greater scope for her corruptions. It might be that Smoketree sought to ride the coattails of her mistress in the same ignoble goal.
Or not. It might be that Smoketree genuinely meant what she had said and yet possessed the hunger within her. She was a scholarship girl, after all.
“All looking irrelevant now,” Reeve said. “You’ve backed the wrong horse, Cinch.”
“The election isn’t over yet,” Cinch replied.
“Schnee is too far behind!” Reeve spat. “You’d need to catch Wistia in bed with a dead prostitute, snorting drugs through rolled up bills she’d embezzled from the treasury to reverse that polling lead.”
“I’ve nothing so gauche in mind, I assure you,” Cinch said. “You forget that what may be a commanding lead in a three-way race may become considerably less so if the field of candidates were to narrow to two.”
“You think that you can convince Robyn Hill to drop out of the race and throw her support behind Jacques Schnee?” Smoketree asked sceptically.
Cinch pushed her glasses back up on her nose. “That’s exactly what I’m here to do, Smoketree.”
Reeve snorted. “You’re not serious.” Her eyes widened. “Gods, you are serious, aren’t you?”
“For better or for worse, we have hitched ourselves to Jacques Schnee’s star,” Cinch reminded him. “His wealth, and the fortunes of his company, may survive a drubbing in the election, but our careers may not. Not to mention the continued slide of this kingdom into cosy and comfortable mediocrity.”
“Don’t be so hard on comfortable mediocrity,” Reeve said. “It is at least, as you admit, comfortable.” She ate some more fries.
People like you are exactly the reason we must change course before it is too late, Cinch thought. “We are rushing headlong towards a cliff-edge,” she said, “and there is very little time left to change course. Jacques must win this Council seat, for our good and the greater good of Atlas. Even if only three quarters of Hill’s votes go to Schnee, then he will win.”
“But why would Hill back Schnee?” Smoketree asked. “The embodiment of everything she rails against?”
“Leave that to me,” Cinch said. “All I need from you is her release so that she can endorse our candidate.”
Reeve rested both her hands upon her desk. “You really think you can get her to agree?”
“Leave the persuasion to me,” Cinch replied.
Reeve glanced at Smoketree.
“If it doesn’t work, I’ll have another shot at her,” Smoketree said dryly.
Reeve let out a bark of laughter. “Very well,” she said. “See if you can get her to see reason. You’d be the first, if you could.”
Robyn Hill tapped her foot on the floor of the interrogation room.
They had put a couple of chairs in here – cold, hard, metallic chairs but chairs nonetheless – with a table between them. They didn’t always do that.
They must have dragged her out of her cell for an important visitor. Perhaps Brigadier General Reeve herself was going to come down and gloat over her triumph.
That would be fine by Robyn; she had some questions for Reeve too.
Like why did you kill my father?
There was no sign of Reeve right now, though, nor any sign of anyone else, for that matter. There was just her and the two guards flanking her, standing silently in the dim blue light of the room, casting their shadows over her.
Robyn started to whistle.
“Quiet!” one of the guards barked at her.
Robyn rolled her violet eyes. Some people.
There had been a time when the thought of being in one of these rooms would have mortified her. There had been a time when the idea of being in a cell, surrounded by hard-light barriers, would have shocked her to the bone and filled her with revulsion. There had been a time when she would have seen all of this as a dire warning, a dark fate to be avoided by any means necessary.
There had been a time when she had been proud to represent Atlas in front of the rest of Remnant, to throw down the vaunted Mistralian champion and claim the Vytal crown for herself; a time when she had been proud to wear the whites of Atlas, and the praise of comrades and generals alike had fed fat her pride.
A time that seemed so long ago now. A time that had passed.
Now, she pitied the two guards who stood on either side of her, these stooges of a wicked regime that hid its wickedness behind a flag and a dictionary’s worth of noble sentiments: honour, duty, comradeship, integrity, courage. She had seen more of all those things on the streets of Mantle and with the Happy Huntresses than she ever had in the serried ranks of Atlas.
In time, perhaps the kids who had bested her on those same streets and caused her to be in that cell and this interrogation room would learn that lesson too.
She’d hardly been able to believe it when May had told her story: the Specialist who picked her up had taken her for coffee afterwards? In cuffs? And then had allowed May to lead her to Pietro’s clinic but hadn’t arrested him for all the stolen goods he’d been receiving? It was the kind of story that she would have demanded proof of – semblance-backed proof, at that – from most people, but May wouldn’t make up a story like that. Plus, Robyn had found them at Pietro’s clinic.
Which meant that one of those three, at least, was an unusual specialist.
But then, Robyn supposed it would have been odd if the Warrior Princess of Menagerie had been a usual specialist, considering that she wasn’t even Atlesian. Clearly, she had all the nonsense words ringing in her head more than most to even come here, which fit with what May had to say about her.
Well, exposure to the realities of the Atlesian service would knock that out of her. Who knew? Perhaps Blake might be the one to rebuild the Happy Huntresses one day.
Since it seemed likely that the founding members weren’t going to be in a position to do much for a while.
That was her one regret. She didn’t regret the actions that had led her to this position, but she did regret that, with all four of them having been apprehended, there was no one to protect Mantle or to speak up for her.
And my Council run is finished, to the extent that it ever began. Perhaps I shouldn’t have pushed my luck during an election campaign. Perhaps I should have sat this one out.
But that would have meant sending the girls in without her. Or standing down all their operations while she focussed on seeming respectable. Neither option had seemed very appealing at the time, and to be honest, they didn’t seem very appealing now. The people who protested that they understood the justice of your cause but they couldn’t support you because you weren’t polite, peaceful, or respectable enough were never likely to vote for you anyway and, to be honest, probably didn’t even understand the justice of your cause. And Mantle’s poorest, those who depended on her, couldn’t afford to have her put everything on hold for months while she got on the stump for a Council seat. People still needed help, people still needed protection from Reeve’s enforcers, people were still being ground down by harsh Atlesians laws and harsher taxes. People were still working themselves to death for the SDC, and none of that was going to change during her election campaign.
Precious little of it was going to change afterwards, in all honesty.
Robyn didn’t admit this to other people, but she mainly ran for Council because it was the only time that she got to put her message to the national media and they had to broadcast it, because she was a Council candidate, and they had a legal duty to keep the public informed of what she was saying. Other times, they would only come to her when they wanted someone to attack General Ironwood, and while she was happy to do that – if he couldn’t solve all the problems of Mantle by himself, he could have at least removed the corrupt officers making things worse down here; either he didn’t know how bad things were, or he didn’t care, and Robyn wasn’t inclined to forgive him for either offence – it didn’t change the fact that nobody cared about Mantle for Mantle’s sake.
Or at least, not enough voters did.
Her thoughts were interrupted as the door into the interrogation opened. The woman who walked in was unfamiliar to Robyn; she wasn’t wearing a uniform, rather a dark blue jacket and skirt over a purple blouse. She had a hard, square face, lined with years, although her hair was managing to avoid any grey in it for the moment. Her mouth was hard and seemed to be trying to avoid looking too contemptuous.
“Remove those restraints,” she commanded.
The guards leapt to, hastening to take the cuffs off her.
“And leave us,” the woman added.
The two guards stood to attention. “Yes, ma’am.” They turned on their heels and marched from the room. The door shut behind them with a hydraulic hiss.
“Bold of you,” Robyn said, rubbing her wrists.
The older woman sat down. “I’m not afraid of you, Miss Hill. It is Robyn Hill, isn’t it?”
“It is,” Robyn replied. “You have the advantage of me.”
“My name is Abacus Cinch,” she said. “I am a brigadier general on the active reserve list, and I currently have the privilege to be the Principal of Crystal Preparatory Combat Academy.”
“A schoolteacher?”
“A principal,” Cinch corrected her.
Robyn smiled thinly. “And you’re not afraid of big bad Robyn Hill?”
Cinch’s smile was every bit as thin as Robyn’s own. “I take it, Miss Hill, that you are not familiar with Crystal Preparatory’s reputation.”
“I’m afraid not,” Robyn replied. “I was trained privately; I never went to combat school.”
“And you never heard any of your fellow Atlas students speak fondly of their old alma mater?”
“Perhaps I wasn’t paying attention.”
“Evidently,” Cinch murmured dryly. “For many years now, since I took over as Principal, my school has habitually turned out young men and women who go on to be the best young huntsmen and huntresses to pass through Atlas and into the service of this kingdom. We do this because we are intolerant of weakness, allowing nothing to hold us back from achieving physical and mental perfection. As Principal, it is my duty to embody those traits and set an example to the men and women it is my honour to mould. So if you wish to try your luck with me, Miss Hill, be my guest.”
Robyn stared at her for a moment. She chuckled softly. “So, what does a combat school principal want with an outlaw?”
“That’s a very generous way of describing yourself,” Cinch remarked. “Others might call you 'criminal,' 'seditionist,' even 'terrorist.'”
“And others still might call me a hero,” Robyn pointed out.
“None of those people wear an Atlesian uniform,” Cinch said. “You represent a bit of a puzzle, Miss Hill. I dislike puzzles that I cannot solve, like a particularly obscure clue for the crossword.”
“I’m surprised that someone striving for physical and mental perfection needs clues to solve the crossword,” Robyn remarked mischievously.
Cinch raised one eyebrow at her. “As you say, you were tutored privately, but your records show that you adapted well to the academic culture of Atlas: team leader, excellent grades, an exemplary record in field missions, and of course, your celebrated triumph in the Vytal Festival.”
“You forgot to mention my list of demerits,” Robyn pointed out.
“Hmm, yes, there is that,” Cinch conceded. “A harbinger of things to come, it seems. Nevertheless, you were commissioned as a Specialist but rapidly promoted to lieutenant, assigned to the Mistral station where you seem to have made a great impression upon your commanding officer – you seem to have had a talent for impressing your superiors; everyone who worked with you seems to have thought the world of you – promoted to captain over the heads of several longer-serving officers, openly spoken of as a future commanding officer… and then you threw it all away. Resigned your commission, came here to Mantle, and became not only a lawbreaker but an outspoken critic of the military and Atlas itself. Why?”
“You’ve obviously read my record; you can work it out for yourself,” Robyn said. “The crossword clue is in there somewhere, I assure you. But if you brought me here to assuage your curiosity-”
“What do you want, Miss Hill?” Cinch demanded. “What is the goal to which you are reaching? What is the purpose of your actions? What do you hope to gain by robbing military convoys and then criticising that same military to whomever will put a camera in front of your face?”
Robyn was silent for a moment. “What do I want?” she repeated. “I want Mantle to flourish, the way it used to in the old days, before the capital moved to Atlas and the mines started to dry up. I want all the beggars off the street because they have good homes to live in and good jobs, with wages that give them their daily bread. I want the wives who kiss their husbands goodbye on the way to work to know that those same husbands will be coming back at the end of the day; I want the children to know that they are certain to see their fathers again. I want the air to be clean so that this whole city isn’t dying of pollution in their lungs. I want General Reeve and all her cronies stripped of their rank and every last lien that they have stolen from the people of this city returned to its rightful owners. I want Mantle protected not by Atlesian soldiers condescendingly gifted to us by our masters but by huntsmen and huntresses born in Mantle, trained in Mantle, answerable to their communities here in Mantle, and not to the whims of some remote General in his high tower in Atlas. I want the glory of Mantle renewed, its pride and dignity restored.”
Cinch folded her hands on the table. “And how is your campaign of vigilantism going to achieve any of that?” she asked.
Robyn smiled. “Is this the part where my mind is blown by the fact that I can’t answer your question, and I admit that I’ve been wrong all this time and break down, confessing my wrongdoings?”
Cinch said nothing.
Robyn sighed. “I know,” she said. “I know that the actions of four huntresses are no substitute for systemic change, I know that we have no real power, I know that this little rebellion of ours is… pointless, in the grand scheme of things. We can’t change Mantle by ourselves, we can’t bring down Reeve and her associates, we can’t defeat the tyranny of Atlas, we can’t fix the economy or mend the broken environment… but just because the battle is doomed doesn’t mean that it isn’t worth fighting. Everything that we steal goes into the hands of someone who deserves it, and that isn’t nothing. Every time we defy Atlas, every time that we show that it is possible to defy Atlas, we light a spark of hope in the hearts of the people of Mantle, and that is not nothing. You can catch us, lock us up, hold us until we grow old and die, but that spark of hope is something you will never extinguish, not with all of Atlas’ fleets and armies. And though it takes a thousand years, that spark of hope will turn into a fire that will burn down this headquarters and all the works of Atlas in this city!”
Cinch leaned forward. “What if I could offer you a more fast-acting solution to your problems?”
“What do you mean?” Robyn asked.
Cinch was silent for a moment. “At this point, I should probably confess my interest,” she said. “I am supporting Jacques Schnee in his bid for Council. I believe that he is the man to take this kingdom forward. And I would like you to let your supporters know that you feel the same way.”
Robyn stared at her. “You want me to drop out of the race and endorse Jacques Schnee?”
“You can’t think you can win the election.”
“You want me to endorse Jacques Schnee?”
Cinch held out her hand. “I didn’t just ask for those cuffs to be removed as a gesture of goodwill, but because I am aware of your semblance. Please, Miss Hill, take my hand.”
Robyn’s eyebrows rose at that. It was rare, in her experience, for people to voluntarily subject themselves to her semblance. Even if they were telling the truth, people didn’t like to have it confirmed like this. Most people went out of their way to avoid it.
Cinch’s eagerness might have concerned her, except that there was no way of fooling her semblance; it didn’t rely on tics or tells, couldn’t be deceived by regulating your heart rate or anything of that sort. It just knew whether or not you were telling the truth, in an ineffable manner. The soul, it seemed, never lied.
And so she reached out and took Cinch by the hand, and a rippling white glow of aura encompassed both of their joined hands up to their respective wrists as her semblance took hold.
“Speak,” Robyn said. “I’ll know if you’re lying.”
“You cannot win this election, Miss Hill,” Cinch said, and the light of aura around their hands glowed green, showing that Cinch was telling the truth, or at least the truth as she believed it. “However, with your endorsement, Jacques Schnee can make up all the ground required to defeat Pearl Wistia.”
“Why doesn’t Jacques Schnee drop out and endorse me?” Robyn asked.
“Because Mister Schnee’s supporter base is not yours,” Cinch replied, and the light around their hands continued to glow green. “Even if he were to do so, his support would migrate to Miz Wistia, not to you.”
“Okay,” Robyn agreed. “All the same, why should I endorse Jacques Schnee?”
“What do you think will change if Pearl Wistia is elected to the Council?” Cinch asked. “Another centrist moderate, another ally of General Ironwood and Councillor Cadenza, another who believes that no substantial changes are necessary because all things are for the best in the best of all possible kingdoms?”
“Whereas Jacques Schnee is going to change the kingdom?”
“Oh, yes,” Cinch replied, and according to Robyn’s semblance, she was still telling the truth. “Once Mister Schnee is elevated to the Council, he will be exceedingly grateful to those who put him there.”
“You want a puppet!” Robyn declared. “You're backing him because you can use him to get what you want!”
“I’m offering you the opportunity to use him too, Miss Hill,” Cinch replied. “If you deliver the votes that Jacques needs to get over the top, as it were, his debt to you will be considerable.”
“It might be considerable, but that doesn’t mean it will be very useful,” Robyn replied. “That’s just one council seat; it needs four for a majority to start getting things done.”
“Oh, we have no intention of stopping with Jacques’ election,” Cinch assured her, the light around their hands as green as it had ever been. “Councillors Sleet and Camilla are… unhappy with the present direction of travel of Atlas, and I believe that there may be another vacancy on the Council sooner than you might think.”
“Suppose you’re right,” Robyn said. “Suppose you get those two extra votes, suppose you win another election with my help, increasing the amount of gratitude that you all feel towards me, so what? What does that get for Mantle?”
“Whatever you want,” Cinch said. “You can be reinstated in the military, not at your old rank of captain, but… how does Colonel Hill sound? Or Brigadier General Hill, if you’d prefer? A rank senior enough to see you appointed to command of the Mantle Garrison without any raised eyebrows. You can set air pollution limits. You can draw up utopian plans to rebuild the Atlesian economy from the ground up. I have no interest in Mantle, Miss Hill, and very few of my associates feel differently. Even Mister Schnee’s interest here wanes at the same rate as the value of the SDC holdings in the city. Give us victory, Miss Hill, and you can write your own ticket.” She pulled her hand away. “Or you can go back to your cell. It’s entirely up to you.”
Robyn looked down at her hand, clenching and unclenching her fist on the table. On the one… hand, her gut, visceral reaction was to refuse. This was, after all, an alliance with Jacques Schnee, the man who had torn families asunder, broken hearts, shattered lives in the pursuit of profit, who was willing to treat his entire workforce as expendable if it made his bank balance just that little bit bigger.
But it was also more than she could have dreamed of, right there on a plate. It was an offer too good to be true… except that it was true, because her semblance had confirmed that it was so. She could write her own ticket, she had been told, and that had not been a lie.
She thought about the gap between her ambitions and her means, between all the things she wished to do and all the things that she actually had power to do. The difference was a vast, gaping chasm into which, at times, all her hope seemed in danger of falling. There were times when she felt she had to keep moving, keep striking back, keep planning the next mission, because if she ever stopped, if she ever acknowledged their paucity of long-term gains, then she would be unable to start again because she would fall into a depression so deep as to be inescapable.
She couldn’t save Mantle, not as the leader of the Happy Huntresses. She couldn’t even avenge her own father’s murder. All she could do was convince a lot of desperate people that she was a hero, convince them to pin all their hopes on her… even when she knew those hopes were bound to be disappointed.
Except now, maybe they wouldn’t.
“You’ve got yourself a deal,” she said.