When I woke up I was on a plane, still naked but with an incredibly nasty headache. The upholstery of the chair I was strapped to had seen better days and the leather was beginning to crack. I looked down at the floor. As I suspected, there were irregularities in the maroon carpet from where they had removed the original seats and not bothered to fill in the bolt holes.
I was sitting at a table across from a white furred katzen with blue eyes that were slightly too close together. He said something I didn't quite catch because between the hangover from the drugs and slamming my head on the floor I felt like shit. From what I could tell we were alone.
“Are you talking to me?” I asked in Hund-Katzen as I looked across the table at Prince Bellsong.
“Who else would I be talking to?” He said, smirking.
I shrugged. “You're a bit inbred and cross eyed so it's hard to tell which way you're looking.”
He backhanded me violently. I spun around in my chair from the force of the blow. “Hey, be careful with this body… it's a rental.” I said with a laugh. Eventually the chair came to a stop.
“Ok, maybe one more.” I said, my head lolling from side to side. “Come on, gimme a push.”
The prince let out a sigh of disgust and contempt. “Is everything a game to you? Do you realize the situation you're in? Do you know what's going to happen if your father doesn't meet my demands?”
I thought for a second. “Yes. Yes. And he's not my dad. Technically he's my son.” No, that wasn't right.
“Ok, technically he's one of my victims.” I corrected myself, trying to be as truthful as possible. “But I think of him like a son.”
“Are you high?” Prince Bellsong demanded. “You're talking nonsense! Should I have my doctor inject you with something to clear your head?”
I brightened up at the prospect of more drugs. “If you're offering, I wouldn't say no to some katzenminze or a nice candy flip. I don't really go for stimulants besides MDMA but I'm very fond of psychedelics.”
He stood up and walked away in disgust. Something felt off about the plane but I couldn't quite place it at first. Then I realized it was too quiet. A bargain basement private jet like this should have had turbulence and wind noise, but it was silent. No wonder they had the blinds closed.
The prince came back a few minutes later. “Did you bring my drugs?” I asked. “I'll be more than happy to buy them if you're short. I understand they used to grow some excellent herb in Northern Katzenlund.”
“Enough.” The prince waved his hand. “We have told your father that we have you and he has told us, and I quote ‘Well, that's unfortunate for you. Tell her to come back when she's feeling better.’ Then he hung up.”
I laughed. “He catches on quickly. Too bad you don't.” Simon had always been a clever one, even before I enhanced him. It had been such a treat to work on a subject with so much raw potential.
“Your guard may have killed five of my people but you're alone now.” The prince stood over me, or at least tried to. I was strapped to a chair but he was still a short little fucker. “You had best tell your father Simon to do as I say or I will have to torture you until he decides to cooperate. We are in international airspace, far from his reach.”
I stood up, feeling the chair rip out of the deck and my restraints snap. Then I gently laid a hand on the Prince’s shoulder. He looked up in surprise and terror. “First off, we haven't even left the ground and the plane is probably still in a hangar near Porto. Secondly, I killed your people, not my bodyguard. And lastly,” I got in close. “Your plane, much like this body I'm wearing, is a fucking rental.”
I smiled, making sure he had a chance to look into my yellow eyes and see that I meant business. “So, tell me, you inbred, cross eyed, little fuck… do you want to call me a car or am I going to have to pull out your guts and strangle you with them?”
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I paused and thought about that for a second. He started to speak but I shushed him. “No, no.” I said, imagining how fun it would be to slice him open and see if katzen biomod had improved in the last few decades. “I'm having a moment.”
“Who the fuck are you?” The prince asked, looking around for an exit. Too bad it was behind me. “You're not Eden.”
“No, I'm just borrowing her body. My name is Gershwin Braverhund. Perhaps you have heard of me?” I said, looking around for something sharp I could use as a scalpel. There was a heavy whiskey glass that would work nicely. I smashed it and picked up the largest shard.
“Now, little prince. Have you ever wondered how your sisters felt when I cut them apart? After all, it was you who betrayed them.”
The prince began to scream and cry for help. That was, until I punched him in the throat and collapsed his windpipe. He wobbled drunkenly as he tried to get away.
“No, little prince. Save your strength.” I said as I grabbed him by the scalp and threw him backwards onto the ground, straddling him so he couldn't get away. “Screaming comes later.”
***
There is a moment sometimes when my head is silent and nothing moves but my heartbeat. There is a precious calm that washes over me and I can stop. But it never lasts.
I stood up from the pile of gore that was once a prince and sighed. They really hadn't made many improvements to their biomod that I could find. Perhaps that was because, as I had originally suspected, all their technology was stolen from the humans.
For all their talk of katzen superiority and divine right they were just scavengers living off of scraps like the rest of us. What a shame. I had been hoping to see something new for once.
It was also telling that the guards hadn't come to save the prince when he started screaming. I had thought for sure that I would be interrupted. But nobody had been brave enough. Or perhaps nobody cared.
There was of course a third option.
I walked over and pulled the lever to open the door and release the stairs. It opened half way and stuck. What a piece of junk, I thought. Was this what the royal family of Katzenlund had been reduced to? Using a rented plane that they had to share with pornographers and influencers?
What a joke. What a fucking joke. I jumped out the door and put my weight on the stairs, forcing them to extend the rest of the way down. Simon was there wearing a charcoal peacoat and twirling a vampirzahn between his long clever fingers.
All around were the headless corpses of Prince Bellsong’s private security. Some of the katzen were sliced up so badly that it was hard to recognize them as people. It looked like random chunks of meat from a butcher shop had been scattered across the hangar.
A particularly interesting story had unfolded near the exit judging from the blood trails. It started with a young gray furred katzen running in terror. Then there was a chance meeting with a taut strand of monomolecular wire strung up at knee height. They had crawled for nearly five meters before they bled to death, leaving their severed legs behind.
You wouldn't know that the author of this deadly tale was the handsome Döbian standing there in front of me. There wasn't a single drop of blood on him, not one hair out of place. That was Simon for you. He got in, did the work, then left without getting his hands dirty.
I personally preferred to get red up to my elbows. “It was so nice of you to let me finish.” I said, striking a pose. I was naked and the dried blood from my kills was cracking like snake skin as I moved.
“Oh, I was just running out the clock.” Simon explained. “You see, Eden is going to come back soon and if you wanted to waste your time cutting up some nobody with a fancy pedigree I figured, why stop you?”
“How pragmatic of you.” I stuck out my tongue and made a face. “So, what did you want to talk about with our last few minutes?”
“I thought I would give you a warning. Don't try and take Eden from me because if you do, I will be forced to take drastic measures.”
Simon held up the vampirzahn. “If I kill you with this, the Gravekeeper is going to hunt you down and quarantine your code for a hundred years. That's the wonderful thing and AIs, they are incredibly literal. All I have to do is kill one of your copies with this and he will do the rest.”
“That's new. I didn't know they could do that kind of thing.” I said, not taking my eyes off the black metal baton. I recognized my creation and knew to fear it.
“You can thank KB for that one. He thought that everyone deserves a chance at death, real death, real consequences.” Simon smiled. “So, are you going to behave or am I going to have to kill someone we're both fond of?”