//------------------------------// // Today is 'Piss off the worst possible living beings day'. It's starting off swimmingly.(Revised) // Story: An (Ex)Raiders Wanderings // by Resurgent Wanderer //------------------------------// Sia groaned as she wiped more blowing sand that had found purchase off the glass of her old goggles. A quick tug at the scarf wrapped around her head, face and neck ensured that as little sand as possible would rub and chafe her skin. She knew well enough that the rushing grains in a sand storm could tear skin to shreds if you weren't properly protected. As she plodded along forward, her mind kept wandering backwards. It had been weeks, maybe a month, since her 'family', a raiding party consistent of a bunch of rapists, chem addicts, murderers and thieves, as well as her father, had tangled with Mormon Missionaries and promptly been killed. Her mind kept playing over the final moments in which her fatally wounded father had slapped a broken bomb collar around her neck, whispered for her to run and then decried her as a fleeing slave as she bolted away. The act did little to settle her opinions of the man. That man had murdered and pillaged with the rest of the raiders, callously disregarding any other human life. That man had shaved her head, bound her chest so that she never properly developed breasts, and tattooed her so that she would appear more of a short and effeminate man than an easily rapeable four foot four young woman. It was blatantly obvious that, as a father, he had been a good man, but it was impossible to ignore the fact that he had still been a raider. It was something that near constantly bothered her. Was it fair to see her father as a good man, even though his very actions as a raider told the story of a bad man? Or was it unfair to see him as a bad man when he really just wanted to keep her safe? Confusing and convoluted was what it was. But, if the young woman had learnt anything from her life in the wastes of the formerly great United States, it was that no matter how hard you tried for black and white there were always going to be constant shades of grey that existed. Sighing from behind her scarf, Sia scuffed a boot through the dirt as she felt the beginnings of tears build in her eyes. Huffing in as deep a breath as she could, she attempted to calm her nerves. With a quick shake of her head, she stood up a bit straighter and picked up her pace, focusing more on what may lay ahead of her. That was a challenge in and of itself, of course, due to the fantastic weather conditions. Squinting, Sia did her best to try to figure out where she was going when a long pole came arcing past her, nicking her chest just under her left collarbone, tearing her top open wide and exposing her less than noticeable breasts to the stinging sands. With a cry of shock from the attack and a blush at having been exposed, Sia shot her right hand up to attempt to cover herself while drawing a karambit-styled knife made from a railroad spike. "Who's out there?" hollored Sia, only now just realising she hadn't deepened her voice. Before she could call again, she froze as a man stepped into her field of vision. He wore red armour that almost looked tribal, and it didn't take Sia more than a second to realise that the man was a Legion Remnant, by far one of the deadliest kinds of people to encounter in the wastes. Raising her blade in front of her as threateningly as possible, she attempted to back away only to lose her footing on the previously thrown spear. Falling on her behind roughly, the girl lost her grip on her tattered top, again exposing herself to not just the elements, but the scrutiny of the Legionare. "A young profligate woman... I shall claim your fruits in the name of the mighty Caesar!" Crying from both fear and desperation, Sia kicked her feet against the sand in an attempt to scurry backwards from the man as he strode forward. With a cry the Legionnaire fell forward onto Sia's form as the young girl screamed. Knowing she couldn't overpower the man Sia whimpered, her eyes squeezed tight as she felt her attackers body press against her own. She tried to hold back her sobs as she waited for her assailant to continue. And waited... and waited... Slowly opening her eyes, half expecting the Legionare to be toying with her, Sia was shocked to find herself face to face with the horrified, wide-eyed expression of the man that had assaulted her. Blood was running from his mouth and nose and had started to pool on her bare chest. This was a face Sia knew well. It was the face of a dead man. Letting out a strangled cry, the diminutive young woman wormed her way out from under the Legionare to find that he had fallen on his own machete, neck now impaled, after having tripped on his discarded spear. Her entire body shaking, Sia fell into a seated position where she would have stayed had she not realised that her shirt, now useless scraps, hung limply about her waist. Knowing her only choice of clothes was to scavenge, she began removing the armour and clothes from the dead Legionare. As she did so, a stinging pain caused her to realise that she too had been cut by the machete during the fall, and that her hip had a wide gash in it. Unsure of what to do at first, Sia decided to dress herself on the off chance anybody was to walk by. Slipping into the man's tunic, she found that it fit her like a loose dress. Using this knowledge, Sia stripped her pants and set about making leggings to protects her shins from the sands, as well as to bandage the wound on her hip and belt the tunic just under her chest. Making sure her scarf and goggles were still okay, Sia then set about making protection for her arms out of the leather and cloth leftovers from her work and slipped back into her boots. Taking a moment after standing to self-consciously tug down at the bottom hem of the tunic, Sia realised just how uncomfortable she was in a dress, having never not worn pants. Still, the tunic came down to just above the middle of her shins, and it made her feel a bit better knowing her modesty would be intact for the most part, the loose bottom of her head scarf hanging about her shoulders and ensuring a bit more coverage there as well. Rummaging about revealed plenty of food stuffs stashed away in the Legionnaire's bag, and with a few hefty tugs the machete also came free of the man's corpse. Securing the machete in her belt and her karambit under her tunic tied to her thigh, Sia hefted her pack onto her back and set off into the now thinning sandstorm. Pushing a bit further, the blowing sands cleared to reveal an old highway road and what appeared to be an old police station. Seeing nothing amiss, Sia made her way across the road, intent on finally finding a place to rest. Reaching the door, Sia gave it a push and gratefully accepted the cooler air inside due to the shade. She also was quick to pick up on the two Jackal Gang members hanging out inside. It was these close quarters situations that offset her trouble perceiving threats. The Jackal on the left, immediately reached for his firearm, but his friend stopped him. "What the hell man, he's a Legionnaire, don't fuck with him! Hey, yo, dude, we'll totes bail the fuck out yo. Like, right the fuck out. No trouble, eh?" Smiling grimly under her face scarf, Sia quickly realised the advantage she held. Stepping forward, the woman placed both hands calmly on the hilt of her new machete as she remembered how the Legion said ‘hello’. "Ave, go now, and I will spare your filthy lives." The Jackal on the right nodded enthusiastically while attempting to pull his compatriot along when the side door burst open, revealing a third Jackal member. The first Jackal decided to use this advantage to shake the second off of him and pull his 9mm SMG. Reacting accordingly, Sia whipped out her machete and threw it dead centre into the man's chest. Sia then spun about, ducking down in the process while using the top of her foot to gather dirt off the floor. Coming around with a faux kick, Sia launched the dirt off her foot into the eyes of the third Jackal, a woman with a lead pipe. The woman grabbed at her eyes and Sia pressed her advantage by pulling her karambit and lodging the roughly six inch blade into the offending woman's neck. Finally she leapt over one of the desks and jerked the machete out of the first Jackal's chest and levelled it at the second Jackal, who had backed up to the wall and was holding his hands up in defeat. "Come on man, I don't tangle with the Legionnaires. I'll just go, and you can have this place." Giving a subtle nod, Sia waited until the man had been out the door for thirty seconds before rushing to the bathroom, wrenching her head scarf off and vomiting into the already stagnant water of the toilet bowl. Despite her time spent with the Raiders, there was little that Sia believed could ever make her okay with intentionally killing someone. The Legion was a special case mind you, but for most everything else, it was rare that issues couldn't be solved with the application of proper grammatical usage and discernment. Cleaning off the blades in the other bathroom, Sia then moved the two Jackal corpses outside to the back of the building before going back inside and settling down on the relatively clean mattress in the cells. It was nice to have a mattress to sleep on again. Three sharp retorts followed immediately by the shattering of glass jolted Sia from her first peaceful slumber that she'd had in weeks. Leaping to her feet and drawing her machete, the slight young woman moved towards the door, debating on opening it before settling with crouching on the reloading bench behind where the door would open. After a few moments, muffled voices could be heard on the other side of the door. "Both bathrooms clear, this is the last room." "So bust the door open, then." "Fuck that, the guy said it was a legionnaire in here. The only legionnaires left are the hardcore fucks that avoided that psycho Cassandra!" "Hey Palowski, guess who's just outside with the Commander?" "Ah fuck, alright, lets get this door open, three... two... one!" Tensing up, Sia let the three soldiers rush in before jumping down, immediately kicking one of them into another, causing both to tumble down. She then slammed the machete into the receiver of the third soldier's service rifle before bolting down the hall. As she reached the end, the first two soldiers were already up and had put five rounds after her while the third had pulled a nine-millimetre and put his own two rounds after her as well. Entering the main room Sia saw that both windows had been smashed open. Grinning triumphantly, she darted straight for the closest window and launched herself into freedom... Or not, as a woman in a long armoured trench coat reached out and wrapped her hand into the front of Sia's scarf and tunic, holding the girl in the air while staring her down menacingly. Realising that she was in some serious trouble, Sia attempted to struggle only for the woman to punch her across the face. "Thanks for the heads up Susan. With any luck I can get some information out of this one. Finally track down the last of the scum,” the woman said as she continued to hold onto Sia. “Strange... he seems a little short and light for a Legionnaire. They must be getting desperate." Sia stood in front of the red headed woman, her hands behind her back. Her four foot four height barely coming up to the other woman’s chest with her shaved head meaning there was no hair to add even a centimetre. The tattoos running across her body accentuated her green eyes. She’d been completely stripped of clothing before being handed back her undergarments. “Well, you’re not a Legionnaire,” the woman, Cassandra, said in a level voice once that had been done. “Or if you are then they’ve become really desperate. However, you were wearing their armor inside of a raider hideout meaning that you might be one of them,” the woman continued before piercing Sia with a green eyed glare. “Who are you and how did you end up with that armor? The truth.” “Would you believe me if I told you I was just really lucky?” Sia asked. “Like Legionnaire falling on his machete lucky?” Cassandra’s eyebrow twitched up. “Considering how incompetent the Legion is, yes,” she answered. “However, that still leaves us with the real question. Who are you?” Swallowing nervously, Sia’s mind raced as she tried to come up with an answer that wouldn’t get her killed. Meeting the red-haired woman’s eyes for but a moment told her all she needed to know. They were eyes that anyone could recognise. They were dead cold, serious and foretold the death of anyone who couldn’t answer in accordance to Cassandra’s morals. “I’m… a… I’m just a wanderer,” Sia mumbled piteously as her eyes dropped to the floor. “No, you’re not,” Cassandra replied calmly. “You don’t have the look about you. Now then, are you a slaver, or a raider? And if so, how much raiding or slaving have you done?” Wincing openly at the word ‘raider’ as well as casting a look about her heavily tattooed body, Sia knew that there was no way she could lie her way out of the situation. “I am, or was, I’m not anymore, but I was a raider. I mean, I didn’t raid but… the group… I just made the food and patched the wounds. It was the only way to live for me,” Sia explained. She also knew it was her only chance to possibly get out of the situation alive. Cassandra made a ‘hmm’ noise before nodding to herself and reaching down to her hip to pull out a disturbingly large bowie knife with a blue blade. “Okay, so you were a chef and a healer,” the woman said as she brought the knife up to her face, examining the blade. “Which two fingers do you care the least about?” Eyes growing wide and burning, Sia realised the tears she’d been holding back the whole time were too much and felt the moisture leak from the corners of her eyes. Not even attempting to speak, the slight young woman just let her head fall forward and began to sob. To her surprise, the woman before her let out a slight sigh and a moment later, a surprisingly gentle hand was placed on her shoulder. “You’re young, aren’t you?” Cassandra asked her, a surprising amount of compassion in her voice. Then the woman shook her head. “Look. The fingers won’t be the important ones and your wounds will be treated perfectly. If you play your cards right, I may even give you a good amount of starting caps so that you can make your way in the city, provided you don’t spend it all on drinks and hookers. So, suffer through it, alright?” Sia continued on crying for a few minutes before swallowing and looking up to meet Cassandra’s gaze. Though scared out of her mind, and even more fearful of the idea of losing fingers, she made one last attempt at her own safety. “I just want to not be the target. My dad, he did this,” explained the girl, nodding at the tattoos, “because he knew I would be a target, being small, and a girl. He protected me, made me look as male as possible. I don’t expect you to understand, but the way things were with the group, looking male, and being useful, those were my lifelines.” Despite her words, Sia could see no discernable change in Cassandra’s features and continued on, pouring out her life’s sorrow into her plea. “I know they were bad, I know helping them was bad, but haven’t you made mistakes? I mean, you can’t be perfect!” snapped Sia, anger at the unfairness of the entire situation seeping into her words. “Was there not a time you just wanted to do better?!” Cassandra stared at her for a long moment before she spoke again, and this time when she did her voice was icy and cold enough to freeze the blood in Sia’s veins. “Girl... I am the reason behind the Divide. I know exactly how unfair this world is, I am not perfect and never will be and I try and ‘do better’ every day of my life,” she said. “And to me, that means making the lives of the people of the Mojave as safe as possible. No one gets away with any type of raider activity here for the very simple reason that I don’t let them. One of the ways that I make sure of that is by providing a warning. Any raider will lose a body part, that is the law of the Mojave, it is not targeted specifically at you. Deal with it.” Eyes falling back down, this time to her hand, her hands that had, only when absolutely necessary, killed men. Hands that would lose fingers, though it was not the first time she’d seen such a thing. When she had been younger, a gay raider in the group had tried to force himself onto her having fallen for her disguise. That was when her father had shown up. He’d severed the man’s hand and removed him of his ‘tool’ before telling him to march before he was roasted alive. Remembering this made Sia realise something. “You’re not as different as you want to be, whether you care doesn’t matter though. You obviously have your mind set, but you want to know raider justice? Generally cutting off offending limbs. As for the fingers… I… just kill me, I can’t use my knife right without them, and without my knife…” Sia trailed off hollowly before shrugging, tears beginning to leak again, “Well, look at me, you think I would last? Just kill me and save me a back alley raping.” “Fair enough I suppose,” Cassandra replied, sheathing the knife. “What would you prefer, bullet to the brain or slit throat?” Releasing a pained breath, Sia began to think over some of the better moments of her life before know. Her father teaching her how to hunt and fight, or sharing tales of what her mother had been like. Her first time cooking for the group, and seeing many of the raiders smile for the first time. A lot of simple, yet defining moments. “I… I think I want my karambit buried with me… my dad made it just for me when I was younger… and I guess just a stab with that karambit in the base of the skull at the back if that’s okay. I... I was never one for gore, and it’s cleaner that way.” “As you wish, though I still believe you’re wasting your life this way,” Cassandra replied as she pulled the girl’s knife out of a pocket on her armoured duster. “Turn around.” Turning on her unsteady feet, Sia sank down to her knees and bowed her head. As she readied herself, she couldn’t help but think back to promising her father that she would stay safe. Cause that worked out well obviously. Whispering to herself, Sia couldn’t help but apologise, “I’m sorry daddy, I’ll see you soon.” However, before the strike came, a new voice entered her ears. It was definitely male and it had an... energetic and strangely happy sound to it. “Hey Cassie, sorry to interrupt your execution here,” the voice said casually, “but I wanted to show you these neat tomahawks that Sparky got me!” “Ethan... I was kind of in the middle of something,” Cassandra said, turning her back on the bound raider. “And there’s nothing special about tomahawks.” “Yeah, the normal kind but these ones are magic!” the man replied with a grin. “Though she didn’t really tell me what kind of magic...” “Did you bother to ask dear?” the woman asked, sounding as if she was long used to this kind of shenanigan. “No...” the man replied. “But it doesn’t matter, they’re magic!” Sia snapped her eyes up to realise that perhaps, just a chance at best, she could escape. Besides, if she failed she was already slated to die, so fuck it. Darting her head forward, she clamped her teeth down of the gloved wrist of the hand Cassandra was using to hold her karambit while using her still bound hands to grab the blade and wrench it free before scuttling back into the corner of the room. As she surveyed it from her new vantage point, she noticed a large golden... doorway of some sort just floating there. It could be that Cassandra had actually killed her, and this was death, or maybe she’d just finally cracked. Sia knew that regardless of the situation, that door was the fastest way out of the room. As she darted forward, smoothly twisting around Cassandra’s outstretched and grabbing arms, Sia remembered she still had the man to contend with, and had no clue what to do about him, especially with her hands still bound. Speaking of the man, Sia’s brief look at him revealed him to be... honestly not all that intimidating, he had a friendly smile on his face, as well as a raised eyebrow. As Sia twisted around Cassandra, she suddenly found a steely new hand on her wrist. “Hi there,” the man said casually as he held onto the tomahawk in his other gloved hand. “You’re pretty nimble, you know that?” She knew for a fact that the man wouldn’t let go, as well as the blatant truth that if Cassandra got her hands on her she would die. Without the swiftness originally planned, Sia made the hard choice of looking into the almost innocently joyful eyes of Ethan and watching as they went from happy to pained as she used her other hand to grab the karambit, where she then introduced it’s blade to the inside of Ethan’s lower arm. “I’m sorry,” was all Sia managed to shout before she noticed that, while he had let go of her, the man was now regarding her with a slightly raised eyebrow as... the skin she’d just slashed through... grew back. “Don’t be,” he replied with a small chuckle as he swung his other hand around, not at full force of course, in a punch meant to daze the smaller Sia. Thankfully, Sia was accustomed to people mistaking height and weight for a bit of power over her, and lithely pulled back before delivering two strikes, one to Ethan’s wrist, the other to the back of his hand. The man’s tendons flexed accordingly, and the folded tomahawk fell from his grasp only to be caught by Sia. Satisfied that she had at least a snowball’s chance in the Mojave, Sia turned and bolted for the golden doorway. *** Practically falling on her face coming out of the doorway, Sia struggled to regain her balance. Finally managing to find footing, the girl found herself in the same room as a second, rainbow hued doorway and two very shocked looking brahmin like creatures, only skinnier and with one head each. As they stared at each other, the larger of the two looked to the shorter one and spoke. “Twilight…” In response the shorter one only hissed, “Ethan…” Blinking at the pair, Sia decided to fuck everything and run rather than question her sanity. Eyes locking on the rainbow hued door, Sia ascertained that it had to be similar to the one she just came through. Running quickly, Sia launched herself into the new doorway, unsure of where she’d be next, but it had to be better than here, right? Letting out a cry of shock, Sia pulled her already numbed body out of the snowbank she’d just landed in. Looking about the snow driven area, she realised that she could see nothing in any direction. Exhausted both emotionally and physically, tears threatened to spill from Sia’s eyes yet again. Biting her lower lip to help herself focus, Sia picked a direction and walked, hoping her uncanny luck would stop being so fickle and help her out.