There was a door close to the stairs and Losan once again took the lead as he hurried through it. Vanaka hurried after him, followed by Kiris. They were back in the familiar main space of the storage facility and went down the length of it until it opened up on either side. Here were kept the large containers, the ones for offworld transport, and finding the right one was a simple matter of following the shouts.
The three of them went past two containers before they saw Reylo stand guard over the slaver that had been captured earlier, and another one who sat up against a container, nursing a bleeding cut on his forehead. Unta stood next to a side-door to another container, with the gun in his hand a fierce look on his face. From within came the sound of desperate, wretched voices. Some of them were pleading, others were simply crying or screaming, but one stood out for its different tone and clear message.
“I said to fall back!” shouted a female voice. “I will do it! I swear I will do it!”
“You do it and you’re dead!” Unta shouted back, and very much looked like he meant it.
“I will do it and I have plenty more heads to pop!” the woman shouted back. “Plenty more! Or are you just going to start shooting in here?!”
Loud and altered by the confinement though it was, the voice still felt familiar. As she arrived on the scene Vanaka risked a quick peek.
The container interior was lit, so it was easy enough to make out the human beings chained to the metal floor like beasts on a cruel farm. They were dirty and wild-eyed with terror, and over by the wall stood Para Thassa. The human trafficking agent had in her grip a boy of twelve years at most, and aimed a small pistol at his head. Her face was wild with desperate rage, and immediately upon seeing Vanaka she started shouting again.
“HEY! I SAID TO FALL BACK, NOT BRING MORE!”
Vanaka moved out of sight and thought she heard the boy whimper. Perhaps Thassa was digging the gun in harder.
“Shit,” Kiris muttered.
Out of Thassa’s field of view, Vanaka crept over to Unta. Her boots were soft, for hunting, and made no sound at all. Unta, amped up as he was, looked annoyed as she joined him. She looked back at the others. Losan meaningfully hefted his rifle while looking her in the eyes, offering to resolve this situation. But Thassa had her finger on the trigger, and her voice spoke of utterly wire-tight nerves.
“There is no way out, and no one left to help you!” Unta went on. “That car is shot to Hell and the police will be coming for you regardless! You can’t win! Just stand down!”
“Find a way for me to win, you bulging freak!” she shouted back.
Vanaka patted Unta on the arm to get his attention again. He wasn’t happy about it, but she insistently indicated that she wanted to switch places with him. Maybe he could see something in her bearing, or perhaps he was simply at a loss for ideas. Either way, he shimmied along the wall and let her take his place by the door.
A stench of human filth and suffering greeted her now that she was inches from the opening, and a new kind of fear gripped her heart like a pair of talons. Until now she’d mostly been concerned with staying alive. Now that boy’s life might depend on how she handled this. Was Thassa twisted enough to murder him out of simple spite and grab another hostage?
Vanaka thought of the Crimson Queen. She thought of the power and confidence that great predator exuded, and tried to step into the role without the costume or the music.
“Listen to me,” she said firmly.
“No, you listen! I-”
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“Listen to me,” Vanaka repeated. “Lower the gun.”
“What?”
“Lower the gun.”
She slowly looked around the doorway. The predator tensed her body in anticipation. Thassa looked confused. Hesitant. She had only had one dose of Vanaka’s venom, but it had been mere hours ago. And while she didn’t consciously remember Vanaka’s voice it still held power over her.
“Lower the gun,” Vanaka ordered her, while staring hard into her eyes.
The woman did as she was told, in an absent-minded fashion, as if she’d momentarily forgotten the situation.
Vanaka sprang. She closed the distance between them in a great bound, clearing the people shackled to the floor. Thassa came to her senses and tried to aim the weapon again, but Vanaka caught her arm. It snapped every bit as easily as that fake one had those years ago, during her mother’s object lesson.
The gun fell to the floor and the woman let out a horrified scream. She was too shocked to resist, but Vanaka still grabbed her other arm in a tight hold. Unoccupied shackles dangled from the wall, and she took one ring and locked it around the woman’s wrist, leaving it stuck at chest-height.
Vanaka’s eyes travelled from the stunned boy, back to Thassa, then to the rest of the prisoners.
Fifty-two known captures, Unta had said. At a glance they had to be closer to eighty: packed tightly, abused and deprived. Ages seemed to range from ten to perhaps mid-twenties at the most. It was a horrible, horrible sight, but she decided to add it to the hangover. This was no time to be breaking down.
Unta stepped in through the door, looking like a solid professional.
“We are the Chainbreakers!” he announced. “And we are here to help!”
What followed was busywork, which Vanaka was very grateful for. Unta and Reylo had small but powerful cutters in their pockets. There were enough to go around and they cut through the chains like nothing, and Vanaka did her part. The captives rushed out of the container the moment they were able, save for a few who stopped to kick and punch and spit at Para Thassa. Vanaka heard the two male slavers outside receive a similar treatment. Her conscience made some half-hearted noises about asking them to stop, but had no idea what she would say if someone were to ask why.
Unta did the talking and Vanaka yet again got a display of why he was leader of this cell. With the fighting over, he became a firm but soothing presence who kept a certain amount of order with nothing but a tone of voice and the right words.
It hurt to look at these abused people, but Vanaka still couldn’t bring herself to just ignore them as she helped cut through the bonds. She spoke whatever greetings and vague words of comfort she could think of, and a few of them spoke back at her before rushing out.
In time the only prisoner left was Thassa herself, and Vanaka joined the others outside. Unta was somewhere up ahead, speaking to the freed captives in the native tongue. Reylo was still guarding the two other captured slavers, who were now bound both hand and foot.
“So... uh... I have never done this before,” she said to Reylo. “This... part, I mean. As you know.”
She cleared her throat.
“What happens now?”
“The police,” he told her. “And every damn media outlet that can be here before them, just to be absolutely sure this doesn’t get swept away. That’s after we leave, of course.”
“And... um...”
Vanaka looked at the two slavers.
“I will clean up,” Kiris said.
Reylo looked at her. He seemed on the verge of saying something, but the words stalled in his throat.
“I will,” the Chanei insisted. “Don’t worry about it.”
Vanaka turned to her with a question on her face, although she feared she understood.
“Killing in a fight is one thing,” the woman said to her. “That’s just instinct. It may haunt people, but they can always tell themselves it was do-or-die.”
She went into a pocket on her baggy coat and took out a length of rope.
“But executions? Murder? That cuts even deeper.”
Kiris wrapped the ends of the rope tightly around each fist.
“To most people.”
She was silent for a few seconds as she gave Vanaka a look she wasn’t entirely sure what to make of.
“Go help Unta. That whole part is for kind people. Me... I have always had a chill blowing through my heart.”
With that she turned around and strode back into the container. Vanaka couldn’t make out the words she spoke to Thassa, but she caught the venomous tone. She hurried to join Unta before she could hear anything more.