“The trial of ‘Phon Drazah vs. The People’’ will now come to order!” A gavel slammed down on the podium, as Phon wondered just how much of a farce it was going to be.
Earlier that morning, Phon woke up, exhausted from a dreadful night of sleep. In fact, she was much more fatigued than she had been in months. Her body was also quite sore. What exactly had she been laying on to cause so much discomfort? She sat up to look around, but her wrist snagged on something. There were handcuffs around it, chaining her to the bed. She now remembered where she was, in a jail cell where she’d spent the night.
“Good morning, princess,” a voice called out to her. His eyes were hidden behind shades, even though they were indoors.
“Now the question is whether you’re being facetious or not,” Phon responded. “I just learned the other day that I am actually a princess, but I wouldn’t be surprised if you already knew.”
“Well, would her royal highness like some coffee?” Tusmon’s hand poked through the cell bars, holding a cup out to her. Phon reached for it, barely able to grab hold of it due to her restricted length. She took a sip, and wretched at how poor quality it was, but continued to drink it anyways. “So, are you ready to tell me why you came crying to me last night? The moment you got here you immediately clammed up and refused to talk. It’s pretty rude to just go to sleep like that without saying anything, y’know?”
“I uhh, had a fight with Drim late last night,” Phon recounted sadly. “I was so upset that I couldn’t deal with being there at the time, so I teleported away. In my emotional state, I naturally headed towards a familiar aura, not really paying attention that it was you until I got here. Definitely don’t go getting full of yourself thinking I was looking specifically for you. Why are you here anyways?”
“Chasing after you and the other Fiends, of course,” Tusmon proclaimed without hesitation. “You didn’t think I’d let you go that easily, did you? Obviously, I couldn’t go to Bisomote, since you’d notice me immediately. I thought it would be a while longer before you realized I was in Hedgehind, but I suppose that was just mere coincidence. I’m more curious about this fight. You and your brother seem so close. What possibly could have upset you this much?”
“Well… we were discussing plans for a new building,” Phon recounted. “We’re planning on putting our logo on it. So, I wanted to make the logo out of a collage of Drim’s baby pictures that Mallea has. I mean, who wouldn’t want to sign up when they saw that cuteness?!”
“I see, so the Terrifying Temp is indeed with you then, and you do have plans for expanding your group,” Tusmon deduced.
“Jeez, do you have no tact?” Phon complained. “A girl is confiding in you. You’re supposed to shut up and listen and not try to pry information out of me. At least pretend like you’re not doing your job. So anyways, Drim adamantly refused, even going as far as threatening to burn the pictures. That was just too heartbreaking, so I got upset and left.”
“Yeah, no matter how you put it, this is entirely your fault,” Tusmon said bluntly.
“Hush, you!” Phon got annoyed, and shut her eyes so she wouldn’t have to look at him, but then opened them immediately, surprised at what she saw. “Hey, Tussy!”
“That’s not my name, but what do you want?” Tusmon asked, looking up from his desk that he’d gone back to.
“Tell me about the person in the cell next to mine,” Phon insisted.
“Uhh, let’s see. She was loitering suspiciously outside of a gun store and was brought in for questioning,” Tusmon enlightened her. “She hasn’t said anything, and honestly isn’t very responsive. We’ll have to let her go later today unless something changes.”
“Do me a favor and go poke her,” Phon requested.
“Huh, you’re joking right?” Tusmon scoffed.
“Nope, I’m completely serious,” Phon implored him. “You’ll find out way more from a simple poke than hours of interrogation.”
“Fine, if it’ll get you to let it go,” Tusmon relented. “I guess a poke to the shoulder shouldn’t qualify as any form of brutality or unwarranted contact. Sorry about this, miss,” he said after he opened her cell and approached her. Phon watched the event unfold with her Curse. Tusmon got up close, and put his finger next to her shoulder. She didn’t react at all, and he finally made contact. His finger slipped right in, going about an inch into her shoulder. “What the hell?!” Tusmon reacted.
The woman’s head suddenly spun to face Tusmon as her eyes widened. A second later, only Tusmon and a pile of dirt were left in the cell. “How unfortunate,” Phon was disappointed. “I was hoping that since that one let you capture it, it wouldn’t run even after you were clued in. We’ve been trying to find the Fiend at the source for a while, but no luck so far.”
“Hmm, I’ve actually been keeping a record of those dirt people, but this is my first time seeing one in person.” Tusmon reported as he cleaned off his dirt covered finger. “Based on the incidents, it seems they’ve been avoiding this part of the country. It seems to me like they’ve wanted to avoid you guys, but that could just be speculation. Definitely the first one that’s been reported in Hedgehind, and the closest to Bisomote.”
“Interesting theory,” Phon acknowledged. “Welp, I guess this trip proved fruitful after all. Guess I’ll be heading home. Mind uncuffing me?”
“Yeah, I won’t be doing that,” Tusmon denied her. “You have a court date in a few minutes, so it’d be a tragedy to let you go this soon. I was able to pull some strings and get you for the first trial of the day.”
“Somebody is eager for a promotion,” Phon mocked him. “This kind of proactive attitude will get you killed someday, y’know? Well, you did help me out and gave me a place to stay, and I’m not really in a rush, so I guess I can humor you for a bit.”
“Glad to hear it,” Tusmon grinned. “We should probably get going then.” Tusmon changed Phon into a proper pair of handcuffs, secured behind her back, then lead her to one of the station’s cars. They made the short drive to the courthouse, and Tusmon escorted her inside.
“Huh, no media,” Phon was surprised.
“Since this was so last minute, word didn’t have time to spread,” Tusmon explained. “It’s better that way. If people knew you were on trial, this whole courthouse would become a security risk.” Even though there were no reporters, there were a lot more witnesses than Phon expected, including several cops and members of government staff.
There were lots of stares and mumbling when Phon entered the room and was led to her seat. “Oh, I forgot to ask earlier since I assume I know the answer. Would you like a lawyer?” Tusmon offered as they sat down.
“Hmph, I’d like an actual chance to win this if you don’t mind,” Phon sneered.
The trial began shortly after that, and everyone seemed to be in a hurry to get it over with as soon as possible. Perhaps they thought if they rushed it, there’d be less chance of something disastrous happening. Also, there was to be no preliminary hearing. If Phon were to plead not guilty, they’d go right to the official trial. They really were throwing out all etiquette with this case.
They started reading the charges, and there were a lot of them. Most she didn’t even remember, and there were plenty that were probably only technicalities so that her criminal score could be inflated. The only charge that grabbed her attention so far was her public indecency charge which she’d certainly be disputing, but would wait for the actual trial to start.
Eventually, Phon got bored, so started looking around the room and began counting aloud, “1, 2, 3, 4, 5-”
“Miss Drazah, what are you doing?” the judge berated her. “We ask that you take this seriously!”
“-18, 19, 20,” She ignored the judge and kept counting. “37 people… so, 30 seconds if I’m being slow. That’s how long it would take me to kill everyone in this room… Oh, ignore me, I’m just rambling,” Phon smirked at the room as everyone became unsettled.
The reading of the charges continued, but the speaker’s tone was notably more nervous. Phon really did want to kill everyone when her public indecency charge was read. “984 counts of murder,” her latest charge was broadcast to the courtroom.
“Funny, you all were quite happy with those murders before you knew who I was,” Phon couldn’t help but comment.
The reader ignored her and kept going, “1 count of attempted murder.”
“Wait, what?!” Phon sprung up in her chair. “What do you mean 1 count of attempted murder?! I always killed everyone properly, and confirmed their deaths. That has to be a mistake. You correct that zjik right now or there will be hell to pay!”
“It seems one of them tricked you and got away,” Tusmon snickered.
“Who was it?! Tell me!” Phon demanded. Since she couldn’t use her arms, she angrily kicked the table which made it crack. Her tantrum was overshadowed, though, as the wall of the courtroom was suddenly blasted open, sending bricks and rubble in every direction. Drim and Xard were standing on the other side of the hole.
“Sorry about the mess,” Drim apologized as he stepped into the courtroom. “We didn’t really feel like dealing with the guards. If you just leave it be, we’ll send someone by to fix it later. C’mon Phon, let’s go.”
“Wait, hold up, I need answers first!” Phon declared and refused to move.
“Oh, guess we’ll go then. Have fun in jail,” Drim waved to her and turned around to leave.
“Cosdamn it, I’m coming okay!” Phon spread her arms apart with a miniscule amount of force, and the handcuffs broke apart with a gentle tink. Everyone’s eyes widened at how easy it was, stunning them as the three Fiends left through the giant hole in the wall. Phon turned back, expecting Tusmon to chase after them, but he simply sighed and left the courtroom through the rear doors.
◆◆◆
Later that day, Phon barged into Feyj’s room on the third floor, and grimaced at the decor. It was almost entirely barren. There was a bed in the corner that looked as if it had never been touched, but that was the only piece of actual furniture. One wall of the room was completely covered in monitors, the ones on the ends curved out slightly from the wall to make them easier to see. Feyj was sitting in the middle of the floor, on a pillow and wrapped in a blanket.
He was currently 9 years old, and had not left his room since he’d arrived. It had been easy to forget he was here the past few days until someone mentioned him. Phon walked up next to him, almost tripping on a tray of dirty dishes. Feyj didn’t turn to greet her, as if he didn’t know she was there. His eyes were glued to the central monitor, unblinking. Each monitor had a different webpage pulled up on it, and there were times when each one would be rapidly flicking through pages of information.
A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.
Now though, a movie was playing on the central monitor, but it was too fast for any normal person to understand it. It was playing at 315 times speed so Feyj could absorb it as fast as possible. Nathym had been unable to make an audio device that wouldn’t distort sound at that speed, so Feyj was just watching it with subtitles. Phon tried to figure out what movie it was, on the brief frames that her eyes would actually register, but the movie was over before she had the chance to make a guess.
She actually wasn’t sure when one movie ended and another began, since each one only took roughly 30 seconds. It seemed Feyj was on a binging marathon. “How may I assist you?” Feyj asked while he paused the movie, finally turning to look at Phon.
“Time to earn you keep,” Phon crudely stated. She then handed him her phone. “This is a list of every criminal I’ve ever killed, along with all the data I have on them. Apparently, one of them managed to survive. I really, really need you to find out which one it is. Do whatever you have to, and take all the time you need. Just know that I’ll be obsessing over this and be getting more agitated and annoyed the longer it takes you.”
“I see,” Feyj pressed some buttons on the phone, and then dossiers of several of her past targets appeared on his monitors. It was impressive how fast he had been able to learn how to use advanced technology he wasn’t used to. “Once I have all the information, it shouldn’t take me long to figure out which one’s alive. The problem is the speed of the computers. They load slower than I can process information, so that will be the bottleneck.”
“Yes, I thought something like that might be the case, so I had Nathym make this.” Phon pulled a device out of her pocket that looked like an antenna and stuck it to the top of Feyj’s head. “This should allow you to control your computers with your mind, and it allows them to tap into your processing power.” The monitors on the wall all began to flicker rapidly, displaying information at a pace Phon’s eyes refused to keep up with.
“Oh, how delightful! Thank you for this wonderful gift!” Feyj was grateful and looked eager to get started. “I’ll find your man… or woman… as soon as I can.”
Phon left Feyj’s room, and decided to head to the bath. It was the only thing she could think of to calm her down, or at least not agitate her even more. This whole thing was gnawing at her like crazy, weighing on her pride as a bounty hunter. She was supposed to be the best in the world, so the idea that she failed to kill someone was unacceptable.
What’s worse, that person got away. The only way she’d be fine with it is if the injury she inflicted on them still landed them in police custody. Then, she could still consider the job accomplished. Otherwise, her mistake would need to be rectified as soon as possible.
The bath was nice, but it really didn’t improve her mood. Phon’s mind was racing through the list of everyone she’d killed. She even enlisted Phonscience’s help, making her organize everyone into a filing system that she could easily pull from and examine.
Phon was so focused that she didn’t notice Feyj enter the room. She jumped a bit when he poked her shoulder, and then immediately covered her body. Somehow, the fact that he was a little boy made it feel all the more wrong that she was naked. “You don’t need to worry about that,” Feyj was able to infer Phon’s thoughts. “I may be a boy physically, but I’m still a girl on the inside… I think… and an old one at that. Though, this is my first time seeing a naked body other than my own, so I suppose thanks are in order for the experience.”
“Regardless, I’ve found your man,” Feyj informed her, and handed Phon back her phone with a profile displayed on it. “It didn’t take me long to narrow it down to him, then I just had to find the proof and relevant information. There you’ll find his new name and address. He completely changed his identity after you tried to kill him, and he’s now a retired househusband living in a suburb. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a few thousand more movies to watch.”
“Umm, thanks.” Phon found being grateful oddly difficult since she was so amazed with his speed. She assumed it would be faster to use him, but not this fast. If she had to go through each person by herself it likely would have taken weeks or even months. Even if she was able to figure out who it was, finding them again would have been an entirely different issue. She might have had to teleport around the world and search for his aura manually.
“Oh, is it alright if I ask a question before I go?” Feyj stopped at the door, and Phon nodded in response. “I had to look through all your bizarre corpse photos for my investigation. That one body that you covered in food like a serving tray, did you actually eat off of it? It was hard not to throw up just looking at that picture. There was… fluids… everywhere...”
“Uhh, no, I actually made his subordinates eat every bite,” Phon relished in the memory for a moment, admiring her past work. Once Feyj was gone, Phon dug into the information. Nile Daster was the bastard who wormed his way out from the grave. Upon seeing just his name, she immediately remembered everything about him. He was a thug running a protection racket at a fishing village. Phon had impaled him on a giant hook, and left him dangling over the sea as bait for anything that wanted to eat him. It seemed impossible that he could still be alive.
Sure enough, once she looked up his new alias, there was no doubting it. He had scars in all the same places, and was favoring a certain side of his body in correspondence with his injury. Phon searched the address, then leapt out of the tub. It was close, close enough that she could kill him before the sun set if she teleported in a mad dash across the continent. She got dressed, made sure her yo-yo was working properly, and then started wildly spamming her teleportation.
◆◆◆
Hours later, her target was in her sights. She appeared behind him, sliding her yo-yo’s ring onto her finger, ready to strike him dead. However, for some reason that she couldn’t quite put into words, she hesitated. This wasn’t the same man, she could tell that with a single glance. It certainly was his body. The build was the same except for not being quite as muscular and intimidating. There were a few gray hairs starting to come in, but otherwise his appearance hadn’t really changed much.
He looked so old and tired from when she last saw him. When she tried to kill him before, he was a brute at the top of his game, a kingpin in his own right. Now he was just a man, who apparently had gardening as a hobby. They were in his backyard, and he was bent over, digging into the soil. For even an amateur assassin, this would be an easy kill. She could slit his throat and be gone before anyone noticed. Why was she hesitating so much, though? Was it because the simple gardening was throwing her off, reminding her of Drim?
Before she could get her brain working right, the man stood up, and turned around to face her. He didn’t seem scared, or even surprised, and even had a slight smile on his face. “I always knew this day would come,” he said to Phon. “I knew that you’d come back for me. Even back then, when you were still just a little girl, I could see the unstoppable force you’d become. I knew from the moment I got off that hook and drifted back to shore that I was living on borrowed time. So, what are you waiting for, Vixen? Kill me.”
Daster spread his arms wide, presenting his chest. This threw Phon for even more of a loop. She never would have predicted this. “Why… why are you here?” was all that would come out of her mouth. “You were a top criminal, and yet you’re here, in this peaceful ass neighborhood where no one would even dare to get a parking ticket. It just doesn’t make sense to me.”
Her subconscious had forced her to ask that, and now knew why she was hesitating. If this really wasn’t the same person from back then, did she still have the right to kill him? Everyone Phon had ever killed before now was slain without a second thought. All of them were active criminals, though, openly wanted by the government, and their deaths were legally mandated. While it wasn’t the legality of it stopping her now, it was the justification. Had he really changed, and if so, was it enough to deserve not to die? She couldn’t seem to make up her mind.
“Well, that’s quite simple really,” Daster answered. “When I was hanging there, thinking I was seconds from death, I started thinking about what mattered. I started thinking about the woman I’d knocked up and abandoned a few years prior. How if given a second chance, I’d want to try and make things right with her. That’s just what I did. I gave up being a criminal, and went and found her. Admittedly, I still used the money from the old days, but that was the only way I knew how to give her and my son the life they deserve.”
“Damn it!” Phon started shaking. She pulled out her yo-yo, switched it to it’s buzzsaw form, and revved it once. Daster still stared at her, unblinking at the sight of the weapon. She slashed at him, but the yo-yo stopped short of his neck by an inch. Daster didn’t even flinch. She had been testing him to see how he’d react but he didn’t try to dodge, and he didn’t try to retaliate. “Damn it!” She repeated, more frustrated then before. “Why can’t you be you?!”
There was a honk from around the house, and Daster’s attention turned towards it. “It seems my wife is home from grocery shopping,” he mentioned. “If you’ll excuse me, I need to go help her unload the groceries. I’ll be back in a few minutes if you still want to kill me.” He walked past her, and into the house. Phon wanted to yell at him for ignoring her at such a serious time, but she just couldn’t bring herself to.
Her mind was in a frenzy, filled with thoughts and emotions that normally gave her a wide berth. Did she want to spare him? It was starting to look that way, but her pride was still struggling to accept that. Phon’s mind finally went quiet when a window opened on the second floor of the house. A teenage boy slipped out of it, and dangled from the windowsill before dropping to the ground. Phon had to assume this was Daster’s son.
“So, you’re really not going to kill him?” The boy asked after he approached Phon. He most likely had been watching from the second floor. His father hadn’t exactly been discreet, so it would easily draw attention. Phon wondered how much the boy hated her, an assassin wanting to ruin his peaceful life. She imagined Daster had told his family about her, the girl who tried to kill him before and would one day seek to do it again.
“It’s looking that way,” Phon finally admitted. “He’s not the man I tried to kill before. You should forget this whole thing even happened. I’ll leave your family be.”
“Could you change your mind? I’ll pay you!” the boy asked eagerly. This was a followup Phon hadn’t been expecting, and was curious about the sincerity. He then pulled out a Common Card, and showed her a number. It wasn’t a lot, definitely not worth someone’s life, but it was all he had.
“Why do you want me to kill him?” Phon inquired, a bit quieter to make sure no one would hear.
The boy lifted up his shirt. “Every day, every single day he does this, to me and my mother. I just want it to stop, whatever the cost. If not for me, then for her. She doesn’t deserve this!” Tears started flowing from the boys eyes as Phon stared at his body. His entire stomach was covered in bruises, fresh and old. There were burn marks from cigarettes and scars from being cut. It was a horror show. Even she was gentler on the people she killed.
Phon was furious now, not at Daster, but at herself. She had been played. People don’t change. He was just as much a scumbag as the day she tried to kill him, maybe even more. Daster had said himself that he had been expecting her, so he had all that time to think on how to deceive her, make her believe he’d turned over a new leaf. So yes, he did deserve to die. He may not be the worst criminal she’d ever hunted, but in her heart, he deserved it the most.
“Do you want to kill him?” Phon asked the boy. While she eagerly wanted to rip into his body herself, she would gladly forfeit the right to his victim. “I could hold him down, and let you get the killing blow. You’d definitely turn into a Fiend. We could get creative with it, and you might get a really cool power.”
“No thanks,” the boy immediately refused. “Believe it or not, not everyone has an interest in power... A quiet life with my mother, that’s all I want.”
“If you’re sure…” Phon pulled into her pocket and showed him a card. It was one of her personalized ‘murder’ crime cards. “If you have this, it should expedite what comes next. If they know I killed him, the police shouldn’t bother you for very long.” She then dropped the card in an obvious place. “Now, I’ll move you and your mother to her car. Go to a movie or something. Then I’ll make sure the police get notified soon.”
Before the boy could agree or not, she teleported him away. A second later, after readying her yo-yo once more, she teleported Daster back in front of her. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but all that came out was blood after she slit his throat.
◆◆◆
“Damn it Phon, you were almost an actual person with proper emotions and everything!” Kada ambushed her as soon as she returned home.
“You… how were you watching?!” Phon was bewildered.
“Well, I went to play with Feyj and he told me what you were up to-” Kada mentioned.
“Little twerp needs to learn to keep his mouth shut,” Phon whispered to herself.
“-So, I went and bugged Nathym to use the satellite,” Kada continued. “Did you know it can hack into street cameras and stuff? We had a bunch of different views. I was convinced you’d decided to let him go, but both Feyj and Nathym bet that you’d kill him. Now I have to pay both of them!” Kada whined at her loss.
“Wait, you bet on it?” Phon was aggravated. She grabbed Kada’s shoulder, and stared hard into her eyes. “Well, you can count on this Kada. In the future, always bet that I’ll kill them!” After successfully making Kada gulp audibly, Phon headed to her room to sleep after an emotionally exhausting day.
Fiends For Hire Internal Dialogue 5
Eleen: Drim, you’re so opposed to killing, but it never seems to bother you when Phon or anyone else does it.
Drim: That’s because they’re killing criminals already judged by society. Who am I to question that? If they were killing people without reason then that would be a problem. It may be hard for me to do, but I can’t get upset at them for not having the same viewpoint as me.
Eleen: Kind of sounds like to me that you’re using the law to shield yourself from your own moral dilemmas.
Drim: You might be right about that.