Chapter Sheloran Loses Her Temper Just a Little Bit. End of the Weird Crap (2)

Chapter Sheloran Loses Her Temper Just a Little Bit. End of the Weird Crap (2)

“Thank you, Sheloran,” Dave said as they rolled his bed into Ploxni’s room. Medical care was free in the Republic.

Anyone could receive treatment free of cost, especially in emergency situations. It didn’t cost a single credit.

However, it did turn out that there were “luxuries” and “options” that a few (thousand) credits could obtain. “Luxury accommodations” were one of these. Since Dave was stable, having his bed moved into Ploxni’s room was a relatively simple affair.

“It’s the least I can do,” Sheloran said, trying to smile.

“She tried to fight the fire,” Dave said. “She wanted you to know that. She tried.”

Sheloran looked over at Ploxni’s terribly burned body, fighting back tears.

“Why?” she squeaked in a little voice. “She should have just ran... It... It was just a building...”

“Maybe to you,” Dave said. “But to her it was home, the first one she ever really had.”

Home...

Sheloran twitched.

“She loved that place, you know.” Dave said sadly.

“I did too,” Sheloran replied in a small sad voice.

The Drop of Oil is gone! Sheloran realized. She had been so worried about Ploxni that she hadn’t even bothered thinking about it before now. The place that she had invested so much of herself all this time... gone. Her business, her livelihood, destroyed.

Her “fields” ruined...

Sheloran didn’t even notice, but deep within her brain a tiny gland, a shriveled vestigial relic now only a tiny clump of cells, received a single tiny little neural impulse.

How were her people going to feed themselves now?

At the base of her spine, two tiny little lobes started to swell... just a little bit... then stopped. No. They weren’t “her people” anymore. There were plenty of places that they could find work. They will be just fine.

She could stop. She could end this madness before anyone else gets hurt.

And the Harkeen, and a dozen others just like them would take over the Free Port once more...

Blood started to flow into that tiny little gland in her brain...

“Sheloran?” Dave asked.

“What?” Sheloran replied with a start. “Sorry, I must have drifted off there. What did you say?”

“I was just saying how much she loves you guys,” Dave said.

“Well we love her too,” Sheloran squeaked helplessly as she looked at Ploxni. “Don’t worry, Dave. Even though I’m out of business I’ll always take care of Ploxni... somehow...”

“You’re quitting?!?”

“I can’t do this anymore,” Sheloran squeaked miserably. “Ploxni almost died! If you hadn’t been there, she... No,” Sheloran said with a regretful little sigh. “I won’t let anyone else get hurt because of me. The best move is to just quit.”

“But the girls-”

“There are other brothels,” Sheloran said, cutting him off.

“But they aren’t home,” Dave said wistfully.

“Stop calling it that!” Sheloran squealed. “It wasn’t a ‘home’!”

“It was to Ploxni,” Dave said sadly. “for a lot of other people too...”

Dave’s eyes misted over.

“It was home for me...”

Tears started flowing down Sheloran’s cheeks as images of everyone smiling and laughing, even the ones who weren’t “happy” with things... with what they had to do...

She had made it better, at least a little bit.

It was home. It was YOUR PEOPLE’S HOME.

A tiny insignificant gland in Sheloran’s brain started to leak out the barest trickle of... something...

She started to feel, not angry, not exactly...

It was something else, quieter, but much much stronger.

“Um, Sheloran?” Craxina said in a strangled voice as she walked into the room.

Clutching Craxina’s hand, was a trembling young garthra.

***

“Uhrrbet!” Sheloran gasped as she stood in front of her bed. Uhrrbet had been savagely beaten...

And raped...

Repeatedly...

Credit where credit was due. The Harkeen stopped just short of doing anything that would immediately threaten her life.

They wanted her to live.

Sheloran just stood there in horror.

“They tol’ me,” her young son said, “They tol’ me that this was ‘cause of you. They said that you made them have to do this.”

Sheloran just reached out and took Uhrrbet’s hand.

Uhrrbet’s turned to look at her, her eye almost swollen shut.

“I...” Uhrrbet said in a quiet sad little voice. “I really wish I could have made those dresses, Ms. Sheloran...”

“I’m so, so sorry,” Sheloran said fighting back yet more tears. “I should have never gotten you involved.”

“No, it’s my fault,” Uhrrbet said in a meek, utterly defeated voice. “I should have just done what I was supposed to and not caused any trouble. It would have been nice though... making... dresses...”

Sheloran squeezed her eyes tight as they started to squirm.

My people defeated... victimized... all is lost...

Nutrients flooded into that tiny gland. The parched, starving cells started gorging themselves...

And dividing...

***

Sheloran stiffened as an image of Uhrrbet, with dingy matted fur, curled up in the corner of a darkened room filled her consciousness.

The door opened and, with a disgusting chuckle, something walked in.

Uhrrbet numbly stood up and started taking off her stained dress.

The vision shifted.

Not that much later (she knew it wasn’t that much longer) and Uhrrbet was lying on the floor looking at the dimly glowing image of her son.

She missed him so much.

She opened a little bottle and poured all of the pills into her little paw.

She swallowed them and with, a tired little sigh, she curled up on the floor.

Dreaming of dresses, her suffering finally ended.

***

Sheloran gasped and staggered back, quickly letting go of Uhrrbet’s hand.

It’s going to happen, and not just to her. Nobody will save them.

She suddenly realized that nobody did “union registration drives” in the Free Port except for her. Nobody. Nobody went where she went. Nobody registered who she registered.

And too many of the people she sent to other brothels came back...

She hadn’t really noticed before. She hadn’t wanted to. Why were so many of them coming back?

It was for the same reason they weren’t recruited in the first place. They were weird-looking little xenos, and Federation ones at that! Nobody wanted their “classy” brothel turned into a “petting zoo for freaks”!

She could see the ugly colors of her “sisters” in the union’s sneers at her people. She could hear the dissonant tones of their whispers, their mutterings.

Her people wouldn’t be safe! There would be nowhere for them to go! And then, when they resorted to what they would have to do in order to survive, the union would have an excuse to turn their backs on them!

...Craxi!

Sheloran gasped as a terrible vision filled her mind. Craxina, laying dead in the street, with a union registration tablet on the ground next to her. She wouldn’t give up, would she? She would keep trying... Oh Creators...

The gland in her brain started to swell as it started releasing an ever increasing cocktail of hormones and neurotransmitters.

The Free Port, your home, will fall. Your people will fall.

Her breath started coming out in shuddering gasps. It felt like she was burning.

“You have to get out of here,” Uhrrbet said weakly. “They said that you’re next.”

They are coming for you. Who will protect them then? Who will protect your people?

Sheloran’s legs gave out and Craxina rushed to catch her.

Craxina gasped. Sheloran was burning up.

“Eaagghh!” Sheloran cried as she clutched at her eyes.

“S-sheloran?” Craxina asked anxiously. “Are you-”

A quiet little “squish” could be heard as dozens of little ducts around the edges of Sheloran’s eyes finally tore open and a thick greasy, waxy substance forced its way under her eyelids.

The strange grease melted instantly coating the entire surface of each of her eyes.

It burned.

Sheloran screamed. It felt like her eyes were melting!

Your people need you... NOW

***

“Sheloran!” Craxina screamed as her best friend writhed on the floor.

“RrraaAAAaaaAAaaaeeeEEee” Sheloran screamed and then fell silent and motionless.

“Help!” Craxina screamed. “Somebody help!”

Hisssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

Oh no, Craxina thought as she backed away. It’s happening again. She wasn’t sure exactly what “it” was. All she knew was that it scared the hell out of her.

Suddenly, Sheloran’s limp body was “pulled” onto it’s feet, almost as if suspended by strings.

A horrible tearing sound came from behind Sheloran’s closed eyelids.

Sheloran’ s eye’s opened.

Craxina screamed.

***

Karen was doing her rounds when she suddenly heard some xeno cry for help. She dropped what she was doing and started to rush towards the disturbance, along with a dozen other nurses and assorted staff.

There was another scream, a horrifying one.

What happened next was something that she would remember for the rest of her life.

There was this sound... a pure musical note...

Then a chord...

Then... Try as she might she has never been able to describe what she heard... not really...

It was beautiful, and alien...

And terrifying...

Then, it walked into the hall, the single most alien thing she has ever or likely will ever see. It was little, dressed in a simple home-spun frilly smock with a comically large bow on it’s head...

With strangely glowing eyes swirling with colors she had never seen before nor wished to ever see again.

It started to walk towards her as it continued to sing a weird, alien song, moving with an impossibly perfect fluid grace.

It stopped, seemingly lost in thought for a moment as if pondering something truly important.

It up at Karen and smiled, the nicest warmest most friendly smile she had ever seen as it reached up and grasped one end of the ribbon on its head slowly pulling the bow apart.

It looked at the ribbon briefly and, with the saddest little sigh, let the ribbon slip through its fingers and fall to the ground.

It opened its mouth once again and began to sing as it walked towards the exit.

She and every single other person on that floor all instinctively snapped upright, their right-arms swiftly crossing their chest as it sang,

O Fortuna,

Velut luna,

Statu variabilis...

She stood there just rooted to the spot until the voice faded away. To this day she wishes someone had recorded it...

After it (she, as they later found out) finally disappeared and that unearthly voice finally faded away an orderly turned to her.

“What the fuck?” he asked.

“I have no idea,” she replied. “I do know one thing.”

“What’s that?”

“I know which room she walked out of and I know why that poor creature is in there.” Karen said her lips starting to curl into a vicious little smirk.

“Yeah?”

“Somebody’s about to get what’s coming” Karen replied.

Sheloran continued to sing as she glided, with a level of grace that Patricia Hu wishes she had, through the hospital and out the front doors.

***

Gregory played “Attack of the Shade Legends” on his mobile as he kicked back in his hover cab.

Yeah, most cabs were automated, but some folks liked that personal touch...

Or were in a position where they needed it, like around a hospital or starport...

or both...

That’s why he liked to prowl around this place, the closest hospital to the star port. It wasn’t exactly predatory. He honestly liked helping people who were lost.

That was the service he provided. People would wander up, sometimes unable to say a single word of Terran, with only the vaguest notion of where they wanted to go. Sometimes they couldn’t even speak Imperial or Fed (he knew both, and a few more besides—he was good at languages) and could only point at a picture on a screen (he had made a really nice app).

A lot of people just couldn’t understand why someone “of his talents” would “waste” themselves on a low-end job like a cab driver. His parents certainly couldn’t.

But prowling the night, gathering up the lost, and guiding them was his jam!

A beep filled the cab, a proximity alarm! Well, not exactly. The external sensors detected someone and his custom AI determined that they were “looking” at him and heading in his direction.

Most of what he made that he didn’t eat went right back into his ride.

He even slept in it. His “living room” was tiny but oh was it ever nice!

He looked at the screen. It was a little thing, kinda like a cute little frog...

But it had some freaky eyes!

It sort of drifted along, definitely out of place.

Yep, definitely one of mine... he thought as he closed his game and raised the back of his seat to a more upright position.

The little frog-girl (it was wearing a “dress”) paused and pulled out a small pistol.

“Nope,” he muttered as he pressed the lockdown button on his dash. The doors silently double-locked and a deflector screen switched on.

He watched as the frog-girl made face and tossed the pistol in to a garbage can with such disdain he could see it from across the street.

He fell, leaving one of his feet behind him.

He screamed in pain, confusion, and most of all, blind terror.

Crack! crack! Crack!

Three of his fingers disappeared on his remaining hand.

Whipwire! he thought in terror. A length of anyone of a thousand different materials, all of them thin and strong enough to be sharper than a razor along their entire length. It was a cheap and clumsy but dangerous, usually to everyone involved but if someone was a master of it...

Crack!

His other foot was sliced in half and then Crack! it was gone!

Crack!

What was left of his remaining hand was severed and cast aside. He looked at the stump left.

“Please!!!” he howled.

The singing just got louder.

Crack!

He lost an ear.

“I got money! I can pay you!” He shouted. “Anything you want!”

Crack!

He screamed.

Crack!... Crack!... Crack!... Crack!...

***

Over a million years in the past, the Heretic walked slowly through a magnificent garden.

It was breathtaking, glorious...

Even after all these years, it still delighted her. She paused at her favorite fountain, a huge bronze obscenely obese tol pouring crystal pure water from a goblet into his huge gaping maw...

And peeing it into a pool filled with brilliantly colored fish.

“Good ol Fatty,” the Heretic said wistfully. He had been a great man. In her opinion greater than any Plath she ever knew.

He had actually managed to ‘conker’ the entire world, holding down even the most obstinate of his foes down and patiently shoving food into their faces until they gained weight.

Of course, that’s not what he’s remembered for the most. No...

It wasn’t his strategic and political genius, his societal masterpiece of a world government, his patronage of science and the arts that advanced tol culture and science at a rate that was simply beyond belief. It wasn’t his institution of universal education. All in a single lifespan.

An achievement that would shame even the greatest among the progenitors themselves.

Was that what they celebrated about Ol’ Fatso? The Tol? Of course not. Oh he was recognized for that, appreciated for that.

But what echoed through song and legend? That would have to be his deathbed party, his final royal command.

Even she had to admit it, it was one hell of a blow-out. The festivities lasted for years, even longer than he had planned, the perfect send-off for the perfect man.

She loved that mountain of goo and still missed him every single day.

A Tol approached bowing respectfully.

“Why do you fukkin’ do that?” she snorted.

“Because it annoys you so!” the Tol chuckled and then stopped, looking at her earnestly.

“You heard,” she muttered.

“Yes,” he said sadly.

“Well it happens to everyone,” the ancient heretic replied with a smile.

“The... the scores from the end of the semester are tallied,” the Tol said in a quiet voice.

“And?”

He handed her a sheet of paper.

“Excellent!” she said brightly. “Even Klebbit! I new that little goo had it in him!...”

The ancient Plath narrowed her eyes at her assistant.

“What?”

“It’s just...” the Tol said sadly. “What are we going to do without you?”

“Thrive!” she said cheerfully. “You are going to take what I’ve given you and you are going to fukkin’ run with it! You are going to grow, and develop, and learn... Oh you are going to learn so many things! You will leave me behind in the dust where I belong and go and do your own thing, your own way!... Not that you’ve ever done it any way but your own way...”

She tottered over and gave the Tol a big hug.

“You will transcend even us in the end!” she grinned.

“I seriously doubt that,” the Tol replied, a bit shocked.

“I don’t! Not for one minute I don’t!” The old Plath smiled. “In fact, I know you will.”

“Is this some of your witchplath again?”

“As a matter of fact it is,” the old Plath chuckled darkly.

She sighed.

“Old friend,” she said. “I need your help.”

“Anything, teacher!”

“I...” the heretic said looking up at the statue of The Fat King. “I wasn’t always... good. In fact I’ve done horrible things... for the worst reasons...”

“Teacher?”

“Even my plans for you, for the Tol... Fatty forgive me!... were rooted in the blackest, most tainted of soil.”

“What?” the Tol gasped.

She nodded, beginning to weep.

“I was going to betray you, a young thriving vital people for the sake of a failed race, a doomed species, an evil species... We are, you know,” she said, tears streaming down her cheeks. “We hide it well, draped in silk and grace, but we are evil.”

Her colleague and former star pupil looked at her in horror.

“I’m going to tell you something,” the old Plath said with a shuddering sob. “I just pray you will still call me a friend afterwards...”

After she finished, the Tol just looked at her.

“That,” it said, “was without a doubt the single most fuked up thing I’ve ever heard.”

The Plath just looked at the ground unable to even meet his gaze.

“I’m so sorry...”

“Well you fukkin’ should be!” it said giving her a gentle shove. “That was some real dirty dealing there! In fact I feel dirty just listenin’ to all that. What you did... or are going to do... or did and it’s gonna happen... fuk!... makes my head go all funny just tryin’ to figgure it out! Only thing I know for sure is that you are a first class meepfilcher!”

The Plath kept looking down.

“So, how we gonna fix it?” the Tol asked.

The heretic looked up hopefully.

“So you will help, even knowing everything I’ve done?”

“Sure!” the Tol said brightly. “Sounds fun! And we’re still friends too.”

“We... we are?” the old Plath asked hopefully.

“Sure we are,” the Tol said wrapping his arm around her. “A lot of my friends are assholes!”

The old Plath burst into laughter and felt, for the first time, that everything was going to be ok.

***

“So how long have you been in here?” Visha asked Lucky as she took Lucky’s bishop.

“Five years,” Lucky muttered staring at the board.

“That long? Why haven’t you been either sentenced or deported?” Visha asked as she sipped a cup of rather disappointing coffee.

“Oh that’s because-”

“Guys!” Tizz shouted making both Visha and Lucky flinch! “You will NEVER guess what just happened!”

“Why is it that you always say that?” Lucky said with some annoyance. “Just say-”

“You know the Harkeen, right?” Tizz said breathlessly completely ignoring Lucky’s reply. “You know how they’ve been running the Free Port like since forever?”

“Just like they hold most of similar areas,” Visha replied. “Annoying little creatures but-”

“Well they just took on Sheloran!”

“Oh?” Lucky asked.

“Lucky!” Tizz gushed. “You were right about her...”

“Woah...” Lucky replied, her ears sticking straight up, a few moments later.

“They say he looked like sliced baloney when she was done with him!”

“Nobody let her have any yarn when she shows up,” Lucky chuckled. “Maybe keep the noodles away from her too...”

“It will be nice to get a chance to meet her,” Visha replied. “I never really got a chance to-”

“Oh she’s not coming here!” Tizz exclaimed.

“Oh?” Lucky asked, “Where are they... Ohhhhhhh...”

She trailed off into silence as Tizz just pointed upwards.

***

Sheloran groaned.

“Craxi?” she called as she opened her eyes. “I guess I...”

She was sitting, completely alone, in a tiny room.

She tried to stand but couldn’t.

She was chained to a bench... with chains, big, huge, heavy chains.

“Wha?!?” she exclaimed as she began to struggle.

“Calm down!” a Kalesh said over a speaker. “We are almost there.”

“Almost where?” Sheloran asked. “Is this the hospital?”

“Hospital?” the voice replied somewhat amused. “If you need medical attention you will be treated upon arrival.”

“Arrival where?!?” Sheloran squeaked. “What is happening?!?”

“You will be fully briefed upon your arrival,” the voice replied. “Just try to relax. It goes a lot better when you relax.”

“What goes better?!?” Sheloran squeaked even squeakier.

There was no reply.

Ok Sheloran, think... she told herself as she tried to make herself calm down. I was at the hospital and Ploxni was... and then Oh Great Prophet, Uhrrbet!... Oh Creators... and then I got kinda dizzy and... and...

and...

...

and then I...

“Eeeeeeeeee.....” Sheloran squeaked her voice raising higher and higher. She would have buried her face in her hands and rocked back and forth but both were quite impossible, you know, because of the chains.

***

The strange slightly buzzing room made a bumping, grating noise and then fell silent.

“We are preparing to debark you. We are armed and we are authorized to use lethal force immediately and without any additional warning! Do you understand?”

“No!” Sheloran squeaked. “No I don’t understand! I don’t understand anything! Who are you? Where am I? What is-”

“You will be fully briefed shortly. Again, we are about to open the hatch and debark you. Right now, the only thing you need to understand is that we will fucking kill you if you do anything stupid. Do you understand that or do I need to repeat it again?”

“I... I understand...” Sheloran said meekly.

There was a grinding sound and the entire rear wall of the little room slid back and away revealing what looked to be like a small docking bay.

Standing there were six big humans in full combat armor and carrying AK’s and shotguns.

There were also two dogs and not the cute ones! (ok, maybe they were a little cute...)

A hatch (like the ones on a spaceship. Oh my Creators am I on a space ship?) opened and another armored human, unarmed this time walked into the little bay and up into her room.

They walked up to her with a scanner and stared at it for a few seconds.

“I am now going to approach you!” the human female said in a loud and clear voice. “I am doing so in order to release you from the bench and fasten these restraints on you.” she said raising up four wide thick cuffs attached to each other with yet more chains.

“It is not my intent to cause you any physical harm,” she continued. “Do you understand and consent?”

“WhereamI? AmIonaship? OhCreatorsareyoupoopingdeportingmeeeee?!?!?”

“(sigh) You will be fully briefed shortly,” the armored female said wearily. “Do you consent to being handled?”

“I guess?”

“I am now approaching you.” the female said as the guards holding AK’s leveled their rifles at Sheloran’s head, their fingers lying alongside the trigger guard, maintaining trigger discipline.

“I am now going to guide you to your feet,” the armored woman said as she gently pulled Sheloran to her feet. “I am now going to attach your wrist restraints. Please put your hands behind your back.”

The cuffs closed and then gently inflated snugly and securely holding each of her tiny little wrists.

“I am now attaching your leg restraints...”

Sheloran just stood there, completely confused, trying to be as reassuring as possible.

Once she was restrained, the guards lowered their weapons.

“Please step from the shuttle!”

Sheloran, dragging comically huge but thankfully light titanium alloy chains, shuffled out of... a pooping raven assault lander... what the poop?

The guards fell in behind her.

“There is a white line painted on the floor!” the unarmored woman said as she stood beside her. “Follow the white line...”

A hatch opened.

Not knowing what else to do, Sheloran followed the white line.

She soon found herself in a small room facing a two-dimensional display mounted behind a thick pane of some clear material.

The screen switched on and a crest appeared, the crest of the Republic Armed Forces.

(Cheerful music plays)

Welcome to The Tartarus Detention Facility!

An image of a dull grey space station with gun turrets appeared.

Congratulations! Your abilities and achievements have been recognized and you have been given the special honor of being considered too dangerous to be incarcerated anywhere else! Either due to your natural abilities, impressive feats of violence, or daunting disciplinary history, you have been declined by facility after facility but do not fear! EVERYONE is welcome here! No matter who you are or what you have done you have a HOME here at the top Republic maximum-security detention facility!

We have the sneaking suspicion that this might not be your first time as a guest of the Republic (ha ha) but we do things DIFFERENTLY here in Tartarus!

So please pay attention, your life may depend on it!

(Cheerful music continues)

“Oh poop....” Sheloran gasped in a tiny voice.