Luckily, Mother doesn’t attempt to punish my grubs or rats to get to me. I’d like to think that she got over her little tantrum, but I’d wager she realized that I can cause her enough trouble that Warram would ask questions in the few days remaining before their visit.
The Sisters of course double down on filling my time with meaningless tasks and trivial bullshit. They refuse to unlock the stove and have bought a lockable crate for the wood to keep me from stealing it. I’ve been stealing slats from their beds, but that’s about to be blatantly obvious if this goes past today. I’ve been augmenting with their civilian clothes, but the cheap synthetics aren’t good for cooking.
Things continue with a skewed version of normal until the morning of the day before my ‘birthday’ when I wake up to Jace and Harper holding me down while Bryant ties my hands and feet together on my pillow bed in my bolt hole.
“To what do I owe this betrayal?” I growl out to the boys sitting on me.
“You’ve made Mother and the Sisters desperate enough to offer us a placement with Warram if we ‘handled’ the problem that you pose. We decided that you missing their visit would be good enough.” Pragmatic and merciful. I can respect that. Their hope and trust in Mother is a bit stupid, but their aversion to people and crowds make them an outside chance for an established, organized gang like Warram unless someone vouches for them.
“I appreciate the lack of blood. I wish you the best of luck on Mother keeping her promises. Please get the fuck off me.”
Jace and Harper chuckle as they stand. “Thanks for not going nuts about this. This is likely our only shot to avoid joining the petty thugs that scurry around Vegas.” The whisper back and forth before turning back to me. “Why don’t you think Mother will back us?”
“Much the same reason you’re hog tying me where I live. No time, lack of options. She needed someone to handle me, and if the result happens, she’ll have more time to deal with the follow on problems once the Warram officials leave. That and she beat me with a spoon because I used wood to cook for you all instead of finding a way to unlock the gas line in the kitchen.”
“You were probably an asshole about it.”
Shrugging while hogtied is awkward. “She’s allowed the Sisters to hoard food meant for us for years, so take that as you will.” I’m not trying to convince them to release me, which is likely the only reason they’re listening.
Truth be told, I understand the betrayal. It’s also the softest mutiny in the history of mutinies. A plus in both columns of my eventual retaliation. “Can I get a long drag of water before you gents take off? A few days is a long time without it.”
Jace shrugs and feeds me a water bottle, then bounces the empty off my face before he walks out. Well, I’ll ruin you first dickhead, that was unnecessary. Well, since no one told them that they should consider biology while tying people up, I shimmy and adjust until I get a little twisting freedom from the bindings in exchange for cuff tightness, then fold my skinny ass over and shimmy my wrists underneath my entirely absent butt, pulling the whole binding in front of me. I wiggle some more to make the cuffs looser and make the binding less flexible so that I won’t lose my hands or anything.
I briefly consider that someone is watching the exit of my hole and what I should do while they get tired of staring at nothing. Tired, yes, I could sleep. So I do my best to find a comfortable position and try to rest.
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An unknown time later I get kicked. I lash out with my bound hands and manage to grab a foot. I alligator roll the damn thing until I hear something pop and I hear a yelp and some yelling in pain. I let go of the foot and roll toward the noise and grab at what feels like a neck with my hands and feet.
“Kimber! What the fuck!?”
“Well, Jayce, you kicked me and I object.” I keep fumbling for his neck as he flails and tries slapping me away between bouts of discovering his knee is fucked.
“You were supposed to escape by now and I got bored! Lay off you psycho.”
“I OBJECT!” I head but the ass in the face and pretty much anything he puts near. He tries to strangle me but puts a thumb near my mouth. I take it off his hands and decide that biting is working, so I keep fucking biting. Between biting him and hopping awkwardly on his head, I manage to get him unconscious with both of us covered in blood.
I start searching his person as best I can, but it doesn’t feel like he has anything sharp on him. I search the room, in case my alligator roll caused him to drop or throw something, and I find a sheet metal shiv in the corner. Hells yes.
It still takes me an hour of finagling my body and the shiv to saw at my bindings with intermittent breaks to toss my whole self at Jayce’s head. I briefly consider why Bryant and Harper aren’t checking up on him, but perhaps the bonds between them ended with their bonds to me. It’s night time before I get free and I’m a little embarrassed about it. I tie Jayce up like they tied me, but focusing on tying the cuffs on his hands far too tight. I give his head a few good kicks to ensure he doesn't wake up in time to save his hands and collect the food I stashed here, using Jayce’s clothes as a backpack.
I walk to an old pump station built from concrete that I’d considered for a residence save for the half hour walk. I rummage for the key to the lock I put on the machine room years ago, grateful that the boys didn’t rob me blind. I stash the food that I can’t fit in a satchel and lock the room back up. I trek back to old town and the orphanage. I sneak into Maribelle’s room, where I see her covered in half a dozen grubs in an adorable cuddle puddle, and drop off the food before I go back to the fire barrel to cover myself in soot.
Despite how serious my sneak thieving is, I’ve got a jaunty tune stuck in my head and now that I’m not tied up, I’m feeling pretty good. I start in Jamie’s room because I know she has a legit backpack and then I proceed to the Sisters’ room for their stash of sweets. I then hurry to the kitchens for the best knives in the building, proceeding to Mother’s office to steal everything not bolted down.
With the kitchen knives I dig out the chincy locks in the desk and dump the drawers into the backpack. I see that she has a fucking System tablet and in her infinite arrogance, she doesn’t have it encoded to her or a passcode. I list the Sisters’ sweets on the marketplace for a pittance and immediately get buyers. I’ll hike out to a terminal after my thieving. I leave the petty cash, or I try to but my damned sticky fingers drag it with me. My impoverished ass isn’t going to leave a Credit in Marks to get cold and lonely. This might as well be a rescue as much as it is a robbery.
Having kept my escapade to mostly personal items, I saunter off to the terminal and bag another six Marks for the sweets and a few items of costume jewelry. While six Marks isn’t a fortune, it’s enough to keep me fed for two weeks, especially if I buy Imperial rations with them.
A Mark is essentially ten bucks old US currency, and with sixteen Marks to a System Credit, I’m safe for a while for sustenance. Also, a Credit goes pretty far if you have access to a Terminal. This is where Warram’s hundreds of credits a year goes to. That’s right friends, Mother could be buying weeks of rations instead of their fresh produce meals, but who am I to audit a budget?
I march my happy ass back to my machine room, reveling in my ration boxes and gorge myself on foods I’ve never had in my lifetime. Pot roast with rosemary potatoes? Shepherds pie? These are decadent, gluttonous feasts compared to two kilos of dried noodles and four cans of beans. I might just kill myself with food this week. Maybe just today.
I pat the first food baby of my life and revel in the slightly uncomfortable splendor of being full.