CHAPTER EIGHTY-NINE - IT SPEAKS!

Tanner actually tried to size the thing in front of her up, while the mutant at her feet padded around idly, nibbling at the scraps of... oh, gods, the matter shed by the creature while she attacked it. Saliva, shattered teeth, a few droplets of blood that had oozed through the battered skin, through the little rents she'd created by pressing the flesh against the ribs until the skeleton became a cutting edge. She took a step back, breath catching in her throat, adrenaline roaring in her ears. The thing was... she could see the red hair, yes, that marked it out as a Rekidan. No, not it, he, distinctly masculine in its shape and voice. Ruptured pupils. Unnatural height. Hallmarks of a mutant - even now, she could see the thing trying to repair itself, muscles slithering back together, skin regaining the old pallor before she'd bruised it purple and black, even the missing teeth were struggling to regrow. Tiny white buds amidst ruined gums. By all rights, she was looking at a mutant, no gas mask, no protective gear, nothing. The mutant at her feet was even keeping a way distance, treating it as more than just another human, treating it as a competitor for the same basic resource. To her consternation, she'd basically proven the creature right - follow her around, because she'd pulverise anything in her way, including mutants. Just follow behind and wait for the meal.

If anything, the mutant looked annoyed that she wasn't finishing the job, giving it a feast, not some table scraps.

Took her a second to realise that her hands were still clenched into fists, and with a conscious effort, she relaxed the muscles a little. The leather of the glove creaked as it moved. Tanner hissed a little as blood flowed from split knuckles, but... no, back to normality. Back to rationality. Away from... from whatever she'd been a moment ago. Whatever that thing was.

And despite herself, she could still feel her... gods, she felt like her skin was tighter than before, like the raw vitality wasn't going away. Her heart was still pounding, her eyes were still wide and resistant to blinking, everything felt lethal. It hadn't stopped. The feeling remained, even as her mind began to ease back towards... towards conservation, thought, something proper.

Like the two could co-exist, rather than the lethality taking over when it needed to, and going away when it had to - and it always had to, there was no question about that. Right?

The creature. Think about the creature. Two arms, two legs. No unnatural limbs. Not as dramatically changed as the girl at her feet. Had the signature dense muscle of a mutant, though - not hugely burly, but clearly powerful. Her bruised back could attest to that. Clothing-wise... it was odd. Almost archaic. A pair of green leather boots, riding high up towards the knee, soft, pliable, and yet... looked very warm indeed, she'd say that much. Bare calves, and a sort of... skirt made out of what looked like exquisitely cared-for buffalo pelt. Well, used to be. Now, it was blooming with tiny, wriggling white mushrooms, easing their way out to taste the contamination, moving like maggots to get a little closer. Belt of some kind of fur, better cared-for than the buffalo. No shirt, no coverings at all, save for a pair of metal bands around each arm, near the shoulder. The skin had swollen around the bands, mutation adapting to them strangely, almost forming grooves for them to sit. Be impossible to remove them at this stage, not without either snapping the bands or slicing the skin. Couldn't even see the decorations, both of them were totally green with rust. Shaggy red hair hung down around the shoulders, and the face had a strange, simian look to it - a jutting lower jaw, a heavy brow, more teeth than strictly necessary... the arms trailed down towards the knees, almost long enough to touch the feet without bending the eerily flexible spine. Skin was patchy with mutations, and where it was flawless, it was eerily pale. Extra thumb on each hand, each finger tipped with black material that looked almost shiny, closer to rock or crystal than anything organic.

But none of it was as dramatic as the mutations she'd seen in the past. If anything, he looked... well...

There was always a theoretical state, for mutants. If you had pure contamination, if you were totally in command of where and when it was applied, then theoretically, theoretically, the mutations wouldn't involve the chaotic incorporation of new matter. Just continuous, flat improvements. Greater strength, thicker skin, everything more powerful or more dextrous.

Just until you lost your mind, of course. That was more or less guaranteed. But before that... you might even be able to pass as a human. Might. This man wasn't remotely close to this state - he was too blotchy, too strangely proportioned, too simian. But his voice functioned. His form was still basically humanoid. And there was intelligence in those ruptured eyes.

He looked better than Lantha. And she'd been barely recognisable as a human.

Tanner's voice was slow. Cautious. Not choked out, just... easing its way through a body that was very, very tense, still lethal, still coiled. The adrenaline had faded a little, but she could still feel the faintest hint of that roar in her ears, dwelling deeper now, moving into her skull. But never truly going away.

"Who are you?"

As she spoke, she reached for her gun again, never ceasing from her eye contact with the creature.

The creature spoke back. Rasping voice - knew how to speak, how to think, but the voice was slowly catching up to the reality of the body. Not as awful as the female mutant, at least. Had some soul to it, even if it had to struggle through... an unnatural bassy rumble, a slight snarl around every other word, a hesitancy with a few sounds. An accent she didn't recognise.

"You... you?"

Right. Be polite.

"Tanner Magg. I'm a judge of the Golden Door."

A grunt, and for a second Tanner almost flinched, thinking it was the sign of an attack... no, no, just... curious. Just curious.

"A... judge. Of-"

"Jaah-dge."

This was unusual. This was very unusual. Strangely liberating, though. No expectations of how she should behave, no preconceptions brought to the table. All he had was what she'd done. And she'd almost killed him with her bare hands a second after meeting him while chasing down someone who had screamed in... his own tongue. Presumably familiar, then. Oh, well. Tanner sighed slightly, soldiering on as best she could.

"I investigate crimes and pass judgement on the perpetrators. I... investigate."

She struggled to come up with more words, with simpler variations. The creature snarled again.

"Cunning."

"If you like."

A snort, a spit - a gobbet of eerily mobile phlegm smacked into the ground, and the mutant at her feet immediately scuttled over to sniff at it. The talkative one stared at her with naked disgust and hostility - a kind of offence taken with her very existence. Fair enough. Staring one's future dead in the face, especially when it was this sort of future, either elicited fear or anger. Probably both, one fuelling the other, the other fuelling the first. He started to move, shifting out of her line of sight, trying to get around her flank. She turned with him, her gun held at her side with her finger unnervingly close to the trigger.

Somehow, the idea of just putting him down like an animal stuck in her craw. Not just because of the violence, but because... well...

It felt wrong to kill someone by pulling a trigger. Felt too easy.

Come on. Be professional.

"Can you... speak?"

"Speak. Yes. I am speak."

Workable.

"Can you understand me?"

"Small."

Just a little, then. His mouth suddenly split into a strange, grotesque smile, that stretched far too close to the ears. Not a smile intended for expression - just the happy accident of a jaw expanding to gnaw at larger creatures, to clamp down with furious force and sever whole limbs at once, a jaw transforming into a bear-trap. And along the way... yes. It became capable of that sort of smile, which made her skin crawl and her finger twitch.

"Not... you. You are... large."

Tanner didn't dignify that with a response.

"You drunk?"

"I am not drunk, I'm quite-"

"You drunk... godblood? No godblood?"

Contamination, right. Old name, though. No-one called it that in Fidelizh, made it all sound... well, after the Great War, no-one wanted contamination to seem too mystical or mythical, it had to be grounded in science. Even if science failed to explain it, they could try. Godblood was out, so was ichor, subterranean humour, earth-dancer's sweat, star-hate, moon-drink, and the glittering rot. Contamination was a bit clunkier, but it was rational. It contaminated. It mutated. This implied no greater purpose, nor fundamental origin, both of which were unknown, and the former of which might not even exist.

"No."

"Strange."

It shuffled closer, still grinning. Held up a long, sinewy arm, and Tanner almost shot it on the spot... before the hand extended, and she felt it tap against her helmet. Shifting across, remaining perfectly level, to tap against the man's bare chest, which showed each and every one of his additional ribs, the shrivelled nature of his organs as they became more efficient with their use of space. He tapped it a few times, hammering in the message. Still not as tall as me, big woman.

How profoundly vulgar.

And after she'd clearly demonstrated that she could turn him into paste if she was so inclined.

"Who was the... person who ran away from me?"

She tapped her gas mask, then pointed vaguely in the direction she'd last seen the figure. The mutant man... gods, she needed a proper name for him. Anyway. He took a few moments to put together the message, his back trying to sink a little lower, to flex and allow his knuckles to drag over the ground, gaining a little additional support. When it clicked... he just snarled at her, sounding eerily close to the animal he was inevitably becoming.

Tanner stared. Sighed internally. Bite the bullet. Don't be a complete coward for once.

"May I ask your name?"

No reaction.

"Name. I am..."

She pointed at her chest.

"Tanner Magg. You?"

Pointed at him. The creature was utterly unblinking. The thing was, she wasn't sure where simple ignorance of the language ended and where ignorance of language as a concept began. To what extent the two were blending together. Was she dealing with something as intelligent as Lantha, as rational as Lantha? Or something barely a day away from becoming like the mutant sticking close to her legs, eyes fixed on her opposition, eager to devour him and claim the contamination slumbering in his bones. Another snarl.

"No."

"...is your name... no, name, like... Tom-Tom, Yan-Lam, Tal-Sar-"

"No!"

Angrier. Almost offended. Did he not know his own name, or... he was rising up now, his muscles realigned enough to be completely functional, the bruises starting to vanish with uncanny speed. Each breath he took sent more contamination into his lungs, each breath healed him a little more. Might just be buying time for another attack. His eyes never left her own. Tanner wracked her brains for... anything, just anything she could ask. Oh, there was plenty she wanted to, plenty of information she needed, but how many questions could be understood? How many answers could be communicated? Before her was someone who knew things, and yet she couldn't drag them out. Maybe she'd never be able to, language forming a permanent barrier. Even if he spoke her tongue perfectly, he'd have to think before he talked, removing the... semi-ecstatic quality of a confession, the automation of it, the passive flow that emanated from the mouth without end. A process that, once it began, continued until it was done. Couldn't be pinched off or interrupted. But if he had to think...

Might be enough.

Drop the naming angle, then. But... his hair, his clothing, his rudimentary command of her language... she spoke quietly, in a conciliatory fashion.

"Rekidan?"

A flash of understanding. A proud nod. He pointed at her.

"Un-land."

Un... hm, maybe a literal translation of their word for 'foreigner'. She pointed at herself.

"Mahar Jovan."

A grunt. Just wanted to clarify that she wasn't Fidelizhi. Felt important. Alright, a Rekidan local. That alone was... unusual. Very unusual. And she felt a sudden... hold on. Hold on. The name, the anger that had arisen when she said the only Rekidan names she knew. Glanced at the female mutant, thinking to herself... was she talking to... wait, wait, wait. The habit of using a father's name as a surname was... well, not uncommon, but it didn't exactly lead to an enduring family line, now did it? Yan was the daughter of Lam, so she was Yan-Lam. If she had a child, that child would take the name of its father in turn. Lam's name, in short, vanished a single generation later. But then the city, the towers, the noble houses...

She might be talking to a noble.

Oh.

Oh my.

She didn't... know any of them were still alive, she didn't... the belt, the belt of fur. Was that bear? Tal-Sar said that bears were kingly animals, not for commoners or slaves to hunt, so... she was talking to someone from a great family, quite possibly offended by the idea of having a slave's name, dressed in an ornate fashion, wearing a kingly pelt around his waist... had to be. Had to be a noble. Like the girl crawling around nearby, the tatters of her blue dress still clinging on. Another noble., mutated by the Great War. Gods, the Great War had been decades ago, and Rekida had fallen fairly early on, long before the offensives that had ended the conflict. Nor was it a city that was liberated quickly, it was in the depths of mutant territory, one of the last places that could be reoccupied by humans, as opposed to the settlements nearer the Tulavanta which shifted hands constantly. It seemed unreasonable that anyone could survive in a mutated state like this for so long without losing their mind. No, not just unreasonable, borderline impossible.

Maybe a commoner? A slave? A soldier? Surely the nobles had retinues. Tal-Sar had killed a bear despite being a slave by birth, it wasn't like the bullets just froze in the gun if you lacked the right bloodline. Maybe a commoner dressing up?

Hard to ask. Imply his status was fake, and she insulted him, she bought herself another fight.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

...a fight she would win.

Oh, it'd take time. But she knew she could take him apart like a plucked chicken, one bone at a time.

So why bother holding back with insulting him? Go on. Try. He'd get annoyed, bellow at her, charge at her, and she'd promptly slam his head into the mutalith until he stopped squirming and started answering her questions. He didn't know she was a judge, rather, he had no idea what being a judge meant. He had no expectations of her behaviour, nothing but what she'd already done. To him, Tanner... gods, her vision was blurry. Swore she could see the shadowy version of herself that she was building in this person. A version completely divorced from the other, the one she'd been building since she was young, riddled with complications and contradictions and points that demanded redrafting before she was remotely content. This one... this one had sprinted out of the darkness, shot at him, then beat him until he was begging for mercy. A man wearing a buffalo-hide skirt, a bear-pelt belt, and metal bands around his arms like something out of a Tenk story had begged for his life after she'd had... barely a few minutes of struggle with him. She still felt ready for another round. And he wouldn't be opposed to one, either.

She could be a brute here. She could.

She very well might.

Who would know that she slipped?

All that stopped her was... some lingering instinct to be cautious. Not sure if it was the last twitch of a sane Tanner lingering in her over-stressed brain, not sure if it was some lingering restraint she had to shake off like the last flakes of a cocoon.

A deep breath.

Keep going.

"Who was the figure running from me?"

A grunt. She made the gestures, the gas mask, the direction. Time was short. The man shuffled uneasily from foot to foot...

"Not for you."

Protecting them. Delaying her. This was all just an act of delaying, he'd appealed to her humanity to make her stop killing him, just so he could delay her further by talking. Idiot, she thought to herself, cursing her own damn stupidity, her own damn hesitation. Should shoot him through the skull and move on. Definitely should.

"You're a noble, aren't you?"

A pause.

"You can kill bears."

"Bear. Yes."

A puff of the chest, a certain flicker of human-like pride. OK, that much was... relatively certain. She pointed down at the girl snuffling around at the floor.

"Noble too?"

A pause, and the man tried to work through the word. He crouched down smoothly, and examined the malformed face of the mutant. A second... and his hand lashed around, grasping around her chin, hauling her forwards and examining with greater intensity, ruptured eyes distorting further as the pupils dilated. The mutant immediately reacted, moving her limbs to resist, but before she could scratch or claw... the hand was gone, the man was rising up, the mutant could retreat behind Tanner's legs. Only taken a second. But he seemed almost satisfied... almost. An expression of sadness flickered across his face, and he pressed a palm to his mouth. Looked like he was going to cry... no, no, he was murmuring beneath it, rapidly, the language of his birth flowing smoother than any foreign tongue could. Closest one could get to speaking from the soul. The original Rekidan language, first time she'd... really heard it spoken. Yan-Lam hadn't known it, Lam might not either, and Tal-Sar had clearly suffered enough in this city to reject it and all it represented. Only returning to see the land of his birth, not out of real affection for the place.

It was odd-sounding language, from what she heard of it. Rambling and lilting, rising and falling strangely as it went. And holding a hand over his mouth...

Wait. The Rekidans had always kept their language secret, hadn't they? Never taught the written script to the slave caste, a policy so thorough that every engraving remained completely unknown to the colonists and the Fidelizhi authorities. Maybe secrecy was a condition of respect, or sacredness. A sacred script had to be secret, a holy or devotional phrase had to be mumbled behind a hand, a name... hm, a name had to be hidden from those who were unfit to hear it. A city considered sacred had to be hidden behind huge, intimidating walls.

She could, oddly enough, sympathise. Holding onto information about the mutants, about the cartel, about the system of slavery in Rekida... there was power there. There was power in holding to a secret, and a strange ecstasy in confessing it, giving up that hint of control. Information was like a river, you couldn't truly stop it, nor make it move backwards, but you could dam it for a while, build up reservoirs, monopolise the water and all it represented. Evidently the Rekidan nobles had found that experience to be... addictive, in a way.

Her mind's gyre widened. Had an image of men and women huddled around a fire, sheltering from the cold. Cultivating the belief that the world needed to be chained and broken, that the world was a hostile animal which could never be tamed, but could be muzzled, gelded, hobbled, held at a safe distance... dark shapes, huddled close. Anonymous to anyone approaching, faceless silhouettes that could be friend or foe. The Nalseri cartel had developed from that fire, developing ideas of having their own thing, separate from all others. A brotherhood, a trusted fraternity which was inviolable and sacred. And Rekida... Rekida had learned from that anonymity as well. Learned to make it a point, to never speak to outsiders, to keep their fires hidden so no-one could track them or ambush them. Fire bound the world into something under their control, but it also took that control away, left them noticeable by and desirable for interlopers and brigands.

Same scenario, but different paths. One focusing on the communal and intimate aspect of the fire, the other focusing on the controlling and revealing aspect.

She waited until he was finished.

"...once."

The girl looked up, tilting her head to one side. And in her awful voice, she rasped back:

"Once."

Even the man looked unpleasantly surprised by that little trick of hers.

"Name?"

"No."

Right, right, fine. Even in the gutter, preserve their honour and dignity. However they could.

Tanner spoke slowly. Articulating her words precisely, using gestures to fill in the blanks.

"You're... a noble of Rekida. Do you live down here?"

"Now."

"Were you forced to go down here, did people make you-"

"Yes."

"How... old are you? How many summers, or how many winters?"

Silence. OK, the idea of... this being an authentic Great War veteran was still a little hazy. Maybe a population endured the Great War, and since succumbed to mutation. Maybe that was the original sin of the colony, a lone unit of soldiers arriving to wipe out the few scattered survivors... no, no, even if the early colony had been that brutal, there'd be records of it, the governor would definitely know, and there'd be a hell of a lot more signs of occupation. Maybe dwelling in the tunnels, sheltering from the storms? But what did they eat, how could they exist here when the environment was so completely devastated by the war, they barely had a few mangy bears nowadays. Food chain still rebuilding, even today. And why would the mutants have left any of them alive, these were Great War mutants, they were actively genocidal. Tanner pushed on.

"How have you stayed sane?"

"Sane?"

The girl murmured 'sane' with mechanical precision.

"How... are you not like her?"

"Why you come?"

Alright then.

"I'm looking for someone. I have questions. There was a murder on the surface. I believe the person who did this moved through the tunnels. The tunnels I think you live in. I want to know if you saw anything or anyone coming through."

Blinks of confusion. She coached him through each sentence. Each idea. Waited until he understood before moving on, aware he was just delaying, trying to buy time for his healing, maybe for his allies.

She could almost already feel the answer.

Braced herself.

The creature would attack. Because she could see it already. The most obvious suspect. A mutated remnant of the old state, viciously killing the representative of the sinful interlopers. Using the tunnels to navigate upwards, digging through the soil with mutated hands, before retreating back and hunkering into the darkness, completely and utterly content with how things had gone. Clearly they were involved, and the strange wounds could easily be explained by the fact that a mutant inflicted them. A mutant's strength and body, but the mind of a human, the motives of a human. There were things she didn't know - why the cartel hadn't been killed too, why they weren't moving in larger numbers, why no other deaths had happened despite having an astoundingly good getaway route, a clear motive for continuing until the whole colony was abandoned, and a proven abandonment of subtlety. Come to think of it...

Come to think of it, why hadn't they kept going? And how had they survived? And stayed sane?

How many were there? Only one? Dozens? A hundred? Thousands and thousands and thousands...

She'd fight him off. His resistance becoming proof of his guilt. She'd leave, go up to the surface, tell everyone the truth. It'd unite the cartel and the governor's forces together - both united against the remnants of the Rekidan noble caste, building a foundation for working against the mutants. Needed to work together to clear them out. The cartel's control and knowledge of the tunnels, the heavier weaponry and superior training of the Fidelizhi... built on wiping out a common enemy. Not an approaching storm, but a clear threat lurking under their feet. Absolute.

It was perfect.

She could see the route spread in front of her. And it... it was...

The mutant lowered his head.

And spoke in a slow, halting voice.

"Don't hurt the boy."

Tanner blinked. Trick. Probably. More delaying.

"Excuse me?"

"Watcher. He... is good. He is kind. Do not hurt him."

A pause.

"Please."

Done this before. Done it when he begged for mercy during the fight. Delaying.

She braced.

Nothing came.

His head was low. Red hair hung over his face in long, matted, damp locks. She saw how filthy he was, how... how his boots were caked in muck, how his fingers were dark where he'd clawed things away, how his skin was perforated in places where the bone orchard had tried to devour him.

"What... who... who's the watcher?"

"Chase. Good boy. Don't hurt him."

"I won't, I promise, not if he's innocent-"

That provoked a response. The head snapped up, and ruptured eyes glared at her with naked ferocity.

"Do not hurt him."

She stared back, forcing herself to think in the most brutal fashion possible.

"How many of you are there?"

"Few."

Good. But probably a lie.

Dammit, she wanted him to be more... aggressive. To provide a satisfying end to all of this. She'd found the remnants of a noble caste that had brutally enslaved most of their population, and had been rewarded for this by that population leaving when the city was under threat. No reason to defend such a place, not after all they'd been through. These were fantastic creatures to end it all against, to unite the disparate factions, to bring harmony to the colony, to prove that she had some kind of competency. This would be her legacy, and it would be a good one, could redeem her for all the things she'd failed at or humiliated herself during. The Eygi business would be forgotten if only he would attack her and let her kill him.

Come on!

Fight her!

Prove your guilt!

Legitimise everything she had done!

But nothing happened. Nothing bloody happened.

Her heart was still beating quickly, her fists ached where she'd torn her knuckles, her body was lethal, just... please, let her out. Catharsis. Everything that had built up inside her since she arrived in the colony, every frustration, every bit of panic. If she did this, she could leave and announce herself as a judge. Purified of every awful instinct by solving this crime, brought to absolution by the fact that she had done her job. Saving the colony to boot, actually contributing to the greater health of the world. She was terrified of failing, terrified of... of losing faith, of losing every restraint. Have her faith proven, and she'd be fine. Just needed proof. Proof that stood right in front of her.

"Can I talk with him?"

"...do not hurt him."

"I won't, I promise."

A hand moved - was this it, was... no, it was taking her own hand, clutching it tightly.

"Swear."

Tanner blinked.

"I swear I will not hurt the boy who ran from me."

"Watcher."

"If they're the same person. Then yes. I promise not to hurt him, if at all-"

"Swear."

"I... promise not to hurt him. I only want to talk."

He raised her gloved hand to his lips, and murmured into them. Like he was allowing her into the circle of those privileged to hear the Rekidan language, even if she could barely feel anything through the leather gauntlet.

"...talk. Only talk."

Tanner nodded mutely.

And the mutant began to lead her away. Head bowed. Looking... weary. Incredibly weary. Stained from head to foot with grime and muck. The pelts he wore rotten and infested with all manner of fauna and flora. Even his hair was twisted with tiny pieces of bone that were still trying to squirm inwards towards the scalp, if very feebly. Tanner's own mutant followed behind them, padding silently, never taking her eyes away from her next dinner. Someone who might've known her, back when she had a mind of some sort. Tanner had a sudden thought... had she escaped? Had she gone totally mad and been dumped in the wasteland? Or had she run away from people she could only see as competition, stronger than herself, that she wasn't capable of yet killing? Was that why her dress looked like it'd been repaired several times?

Oh, gods...

What was she getting into?

The man knew how to navigate the river, at least. He steered away from the orchard, remained very close to the walls. Tanner kept her gun at her side, never holstering it. Her lantern bounced on her waist, and with the twisting shapes of the orchard, it seemed like there was a vast, insane shadow play happening all around them. A very odd trio. The man in front. Tanner in the middle. The mutant at the back. Wandering by the side of the twisting pseudo-forest, the waste pile of an existential war. He knew to find the places where there was only mutalith, avoiding the usual pitfalls, sometimes even clambering up the slope of the wall like some sort of mountain goat, finding hand-holds and foot-holds that Tanner could barely discern. She spoke suddenly, the chaotic churn of feelings running through her making it easier to speak, if only automatically, without thought.

"Where are we going?"

"Home."

"What were you doing out here?"

He turned, squinting in confusion.

"Out here. Why?"

A second of silence. And he... reached for the orchard, where vines and bones were already stretching out to eat of his contamination. He plucked a single rib, tiny and fragile, then raised it to his nose and had a quick sniff.

Cast it away immediately, a flicker of disgust passing over his features. The mutant following behind didn't even warrant it with a glance of interest.

Ah.

Hard to explain in language, easy to do so with action. He was out here harvesting contamination for... himself? For the others? Had an image of them harvesting contamination in order to grow stronger, larger, stranger, becoming an army of shambling monsters ready to wipe out everything on the surface. Dedicating themselves to revenge instead of anything else. Must be fairly subtle, if they could exist here without bothering the cartel or the theurgists, while also surviving a landscape that was still straining to reach out and consume one of their members.

There was no talk as they walked.

He was barely capable of it. And she knew he'd either lie, deflect, react with anger... he wouldn't say anything straight, had to keep the secrets of his people, and that was if he could communicate at all past the language barrier. No idea how many memories lived in his head. How much was already gone, washed away by a tide of hunger.

They didn't walk for long. She'd been closer than she thought to the entrance to the tunnels, and she took a deep breath. Expected to go back into that dusty, dark place, once more for an attempt on her life. But to her surprise, the mutant didn't turn here. Why would... hm, was it too obvious? Did they think the theurgists monitored this place? She couldn't even see to the tunnels from here, the angle of the channel was a bit too variable, the interior far too dark. Just saw a gaping rent in the wall of the river... then nothing. Marched onwards.

And now they stopped.

Beside a fissure.

Ah.

Now this made a little more sense. The mutant turned...

Tanner's grip on her gun tightened.

"I won't go in there. We talk outside."

He grunted, and didn't object. Slithered inside with uncanny ease... she heard something moving about in the fissure, a small patter of hurried talking, more movement... they were probably planning out their attack. She glanced at the mutant beside her, monitoring her reactions. She stared into the crevice with deadly intent, sniffing the air repeatedly. If she looked likely to run, Tanner would join her. The mutant could smell how many things were in there, and she'd even be able to smell how contaminated they were. More than enough information to decide whether or not running was a good option.

Tanner waited.

The mutant waited beside her.

The latter didn't run. So the former remained still.

A long minute passed...

And something started to emerge.

Not the first mutant. Not the man she'd almost killed. Something else. Her gun was ready, loaded, cocked, active. Her boots slid backwards as she gained some distance quickly, her heartbeat began to quicken...

And the thing that emerged wasn't the small figure, either.

Trap, trap... it was enormous, heavily mutated, monstrous. Ruptured eyes, as per usual. Red hair, as per usual. But... some things were different. Only one arm. The other had been severed long ago, and in its place was a writhing mass of long, red ribbons, none of them especially long, all of them especially mobile. The flesh was mottled and scarred repeatedly, the face was marred by a number of heavy horns protruding from the skull, the jaw, the cheeks... a nest of curling ivory gougers, wickedly sharp and gleaming in the dim light of her lantern. The torso was swollen with muscle, and the bare flesh twitched every so often... translucent chitin lay over whole stretches, protecting the most vulnerable organs. His one remaining arm was clustered with strange additions, vestigial limbs that were eerily flexible, long insectile stingers that bristled thorn-like from the flesh, wide blue blisters that crowded near the elbow, which itself was tipped with a vicious spur. Another skirt of pelts, another belt of fur, another pair of green boots, another... no, that was new. A cloak of red, faded and ragged, barely held together by threads in some places.

The red cloth in the governor's office.

That hand, so brutally muscled and ornamented with reinforcing knobs of bone, could easily have crushed the governor to death.

Her grip on the gun tightened.

The thing paused.

Stared, with eyes that had far too much intelligence in them.

And it slowly bowed its head, before murmuring softly in the Rekidan language.

A voice came from behind it. Higher. More human. And now the figure limped into view, garbed in protective clothing, face shielded by a mask...

"My general says that he bids you welcome, and apologises for any unpleasantness that may have resulted. He apologises for my actions."

Male, but... not a boy. Slight, yes. Short, yes. Weak, yes. But the voice was older than she'd thought, much older. The mixture of the two made it hard to gauge how old he really was. He bowed his masked head, voice hesitating from time to time, accents wrestling for dominance - traces of Fidelizhi, traces of Rekidan, traces of other things she didn't recognise, even the slight burr of a mutant's contorted throat, though he seemed to be completely human.

"My general greets you. My general extends the warm gift of hospitality. He apologises for our debased living, and hopes one day that there may be discussions under better halls. He asks if you are comfortable here, for he would be glad to honour you with food served as humans would eat it, and with a place to rest."

Tanner shivered.

"I'm quite well out here, sir."

A muttered translation. The creature murmured a little in response, the red ribbons of his stump twitching erratically.

"My general understands your reticence, though he is saddened by the decline of trust in the world. He recalls when guest-right was universally held, and enemies could dine together in peace by the light of the same fire. But he says he rambles too much, and would like to... speak with you. It has been some time since he has made parley with an outsider."

Tanner blinked.

"...oh."

No translation needed for that. The... general? The general nodded his huge head, tusks and horns and antlers gleaming, before he murmured once more.

"He thanks you for returning this lost one. We shall inter her with the martyrs."

A pause. The mutant seemed fairly nonplussed by being thought of as a 'lost one', who needed to be... interred?

"And as for yourself, my general would like to... speak at length, and in detail."

Another pause, the boy struggling with his words, nodding along as the general added to his statement.

"He would like to speak, before the establishment of hostilities. As was right and proper, in the old days. It was proper for rival generals to make conversation, though he begs pardon for not providing the sweet honey of the Ina tree, but he understands your fear of removing your mask. He apologises sincerely for not having loyal servants to cater to your every need, but you find him in impoverished circumstances. He apologises for not providing you with a cup of bear-blood, though he knows it is traditional, and once more begs pardon, and offers no excuses for his lax hospitality. He offers you welcome, and all the protections it grants - and as a foreigner, he does not press upon you the weight of obligation and responsibility. Consider yourself free of burden. He honours you as a guest. And a... woman of such... stature would be a worthy individual to talk with, before things begin."

He swallowed.

"Especially... especially since the usual candidate for such conversations been slain by our hands. A deed of which we take responsibility, though we wish to speak further, for there are details to which none but ourselves are privy. We greet you, by the nameless faces and the sacred chains."

The general spoke, this time louder, and in a haling rendition of her own language.

"We... greet you. And salute you. Before the end. Honoured opponent."

His palm slapped heavily into the ground, hard enough to make the stone shake. A kind of... half-prostration, a strange inverted salute. His eyes, bright with intelligence, were heavy with the weight of his thoughts, his doubts, his responsibilities... staring at her and challenging her to retort.

Oh.

Well.

If that was how it went...

Then that was how it went.

"May I have a table for my papers, please?"