(8) Sinless Days: A Transitional Period

--- Julie ---

“Um, what exactly do you need us to, uh, do?” Bell asked, once she’d gathered the girls together.

“We are going to clean this place up, because… Honestly, this place is filthy I mean like, look at this…” She wiped a rag on part of the wall and a dark streak of dust came off.

“Is it really that bad?” Scarlet asked, in an attitude similar to Mercer, whenever she made him clean anything deeper than the dishes and floors.

She frowned and pointed at the rag. “You do see this, right?”

“Yeah, but I’m pretty sure you’d get worse in any of the streets I slept in.” The teen shrugged.

She inhaled before exhaling. “Maybe, but you live indoors now and that means we need to keep the filthy outdoors, outside.”

“Is that why they, uh, they kept the labs so clean?” Bell frowned curiously.

She paused, feeling like she was stepping on a landmine. “Uh, what about… the labs?”

“Ugh, they always made sure the labs were spotless.” Scarlet explained with a groan. “They were constantly hosing everything down with this… chemical filled water that made the whole place stink even worse than if they’d just left the blood everywhere.”

“Mm.” She nodded, sucking in her lips to keep from saying anything because (what are you supposed to say to that?)

“I didn’t mind it as much…” Bell admitted. “As long as they weren’t spraying us with the room.”

She inhaled and exhaled again, this time having to clench her eyes shut as she fought down the desire to march over to Mercer and make him call in every favor he had to burn down whoever hurt these girls. (He’ll get to it. I know he will. He’s already sicked Vigilance on them. He just… needs a bit more time.)

“Uh, are, are you okay?” Bell (the sweetheart) asked.

“No, but I will be.” She assured the girl. (I just need Mercer to kill some people for me.)

That was a perk of being married to a violent vigilante that most people overlooked for some reason.

“Either way, why don’t we clean up y’alls room and then you two can take the rest of the afternoon off to do… whatever you to do?” She frowned, realizing she wasn’t sure what the two liked to do beyond books and TV. (Then again, they might not know themselves…)

“In fact, since you guys are still getting used to the Way, why don’t you go out and explore a bit?” She suggested.

Bell frowned. “Is… is that a good idea… I mean going out without Mercer, or uh, you?”

“It’ll be fine. I’m sure between the two of you you can handle anyone that bothers you.” At least if what Mercer had told her about them held true. (And he doesn’t lie to me so…) “Just be careful of who you eat. There’s some slimy creeps out there that’ll give you indigestion if you eat them.”

“I’m not… really… hungry.” Bell admitted with a grimace, and a ping of something more… troubling.

“Well, it’ll still be good for you two to get out a bit later. Especially since if you don’t Mercer is going to force you to watch this video while he and Charlie bicker about it.” (Which is going to be such-)

--- Mercer ---

“Bullshit!” Charlie yelled, throwing her candy at the tv screen as he skull slammed the Mist Mimic of Hard Knocks into the pavement. “That is such bullshit!”

“Nope, it’s true shit.” He argued with no small amount of smugness.

“That’s a poser ass mimic and you know it, you bitch!” His younger sister growled. “This does not count as you one v sixing the Vigils!”

“I clearly have video footage saying otherwise!” He disagreed as he watched his video counterpart’s standoff with Safeguard.

“All I see is you getting stomped by a fake.” Charlie shot back, before being forced to eat those words as he started properly fighting Safeguard.

“Hey, out of curiosity how would you guys actually rank the Vigils in a line up?” Julie asked, more entertained by the bickering siblings than the fight footage on the screen. “And I mean without the ‘I’m number one’ bias you insist on.”

“Eh, depends on the situation.” He answered as he plopped down next to his wife.

“Yeah, everyone is good at different things.” His sister agreed as she plopped down on top of them.

“I’m probably the best if we go all out, as seen here.” He elaborated as he glared at his sister knowing what she was pulling.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“But if it’s just fisticuffs then Swansong can kick his ass.” Charlie tacted on just before he shoved her off of them. “Oof! Asshole…”

Julie gave him an unimpressed look and he shrugged before leaning on top of her so that his sister couldn’t. “As much as I hate to admit it, the asshole- Wait, need to narrow that down. Vigilance would be in the top three no matter how you look at it, but I wouldn’t call him number one in anything these days.”

“If weapons are allowed I’d say it’s a tie between Mercer and Safeguard, since shield beats gun and Safeguard is more experienced.” His sister added as she climbed over them and atop the back of the couch.

“Ah, but I have an eldritch horror gun.” He reminded her, even as they started swatting at each other. (Fall damn it, fall!)

Charlie scoffed. “Can it shoot through an M.A.D. alloy shield?”

“I had these weird phase shots once that could, but uh, Betty said if I ever used those on someone again she’d quit treating me.” He admitted, unable to help but remember what those phase shots did to a person if he wasn’t shooting through something.

“What do they cause cancer or something?” Julie frowned, before glaring at him. “You didn’t bring cancer bullets into this house did you?”

“No, I did not bring cancer bullets into this house.” He honestly answered.

His wife narrowed her eyes. “What about our old houses?”

“Uh,” He looked around before spotting the screen. “Hey, look there’s footage of me beating up… someone in a wheelchair… This, uh, this really isn’t a good look for me.”

Charlie gave him a dry look. “You know if Nightwatch ever sees that, she’s going to swarm the Way in those drones she stole from Network.”

“Yeah, she’s the one who could kill me from a country away if she wasn’t a goody two shoes.” He nodded, glad for the change of topic. “Luckily her black and white morality, while often fucking me, prevents her from actually being a threat to me.”

“Meaning thats two things she’s unwilling to ever do with you.” Charlie pointed out just before he shoved her off the back of the couch.

“I’m over her.” He scoffed, nuzzling his wife.

“Would you say no if I offered a threesome with her?” Julie asked with a little smirk.

He froze. “I… feel like… this is a trap…” His eyes narrowed. “For multiple reasons.”

“It was.” His wife admitted, with a pat of his cheek. “Oh, it’s just you and Vigilance now.”

“What no! We missed like, the second best part!” He frowned, before swiping the remote so that everyone could see him kill Safeguard via crotch shot.

Charlie winced. “Oof, I like that, but I still felt that.”

“Ha! I need to send that to one of those funniest video shows.” He chuckled, because even if they’d never air it having that clip floating about might make the overly nice Vigil leave him alone for once. “Oh, and here’s the part that proves I’m more badass than any of the Vigils.”

The screen played out his fight with Vigilance, the whole thing going far faster now than it had in the actual fight when he was riding an adrenaline rush to keep going.

Which unfortunately allowed him to process Vigilance’s line about him and the gutter, something that made Julie hold him a bit closer as Charlie leaned over the couch and slightly onto him.

The gunshot wasn’t as cathartic the second time, but… he wasn’t hurting as much this time around either.

--- Bell ---

The two of them made their way through the streets of the Way, easily able to hear gunshots, screams, and more echoing from far off as they went. Normally it wasn’t something she could hear, if only because the sounds of the city drowned it all out, but today she wasn’t simply hearing these things with her ears, rather…

(In that alley… Three weeks ago a boy bled out… A victim solely because he saw too much…)

Her other selves were whispering a thousand miseries to her as they walked.

“You okay?” Scarlet frowned, noticing how she was stumbling every so often.

She swallowed down a grimace and tried to smile. “Y-yeah, just getting… a little too much from everything.”

It wasn’t a problem she’d really had in the labs, because while her other selves would tell her everything going on in the lab all of that was rote enough that she could ignore it all. Or rather, she did ignore it all…

(This city is to alive… And we’re too free… Neither can be ignored…)

She took a deep breath when she noticed her sister’s worried look. “Sorry… there’s just, there’s just so much going on that it’s messing with my head.”

“I, uh, I know what you mean.” Scarlet admitted with an expression halfway between worry and excitement as she led her to a stoop. “There’s so many more sounds, smells, and everything else out here that it’s all… so much more than back in the labs! I could barely move when I first got out but…”

“But…” She prodded.

“I don’t think that’s the worst thing.” Scarlet confessed. “I mean, back in the lab there was nothing but the thrum of machines or the… screams of others. While out here we’ve got…” Her sister gestured towards everything.

(Within a hundred paces… A dozen souls lost… To the monster that refuses death…)

“I’m, uh, I’m pretty sure I’m still hearing screams…” She had to point out, her vision briefly flickering as she saw a dozen shadows watching, none of them her own.

“Maybe but… at the very least people seem to be trying to stop them… Or Mercer is at least.” Scarlet shrugged, her eyes gaining an angry sort of focus as they began to glow red. “That’s better than the people who just make more screams.”

“It… it is…” She couldn’t argue, her eyes beginning to drift around as she looked at the buildings around them. “But… a lot of people have died here…”

Her sister grimaced before nodding. “I don’t doubt it but… this place is still standing after all those horror stories Mercer keeps telling us… Like, like how we’re still standing after everything we’ve been through and I… I like that? I think… and I like how Mercer has done the same? I, I don’t know…”

She didn’t really know either, while she knew her current situation was significantly better than before, and she was quite happy with that but… That didn’t change the… feeling she got from walking these streets for too long without anything to focus on.

(A land abandoned by law… Burned down time and again by monsters… But preserved through blood and spite… And open to all willing to accept its ways…)

(Preserved through blood and spite and open to all willing to accept its ways…) She repeated to herself, while thinking about what Scarlet had said.

The world flickered once more and saw the shadows watching her again, only this time she realized there was no hostility in their gazes like she’d seen from all the shadows in the lab. Merely acceptance of how things were and the place she and her sister had in it.

As the world returned to the normality her sister had never seen beyond, she found herself climbing back to her feet. “Come on, we’ve got to keep exploring if we don’t want to get lost.”