Chapter Text
People often theorize about how one feels on death’s door. Some talk about the “life flashing before the eyes” concept, others wistfully muse about falling into a great, deep sleep. Many theories exist besides those, but all of them are wrong. There is no comfort in dying, no absolution or relaxation. It is cold, scary, and incredibly disturbing.
Such were the feelings of Patricia Birch. She lay in a bush, cold and alone, slowly losing the precious ounces of blood from the many wounds that were inflicted upon her. Sure, her adversaries spared her life and left her some “tools” to patch herself up, but there was little that could be done out in the field for her state. In the condition that she was, a full surgical team at a state-of-the-art hospital was necessary, or something of an equivalent.
Groaning softly, she tried to lift herself such that she could reach for the first-aid kit lying beside her busted shoulder. As soon as she put some strain on her muscles and began to shift the weight of her torso, her whole body shivered in a nauseating manner. A moment later, her muscles failed as her barely-lifted back flopped back down onto the damp ground. She quickly realized that the dampness she felt must have been her blood, the thought of which brought around yet another sickening shiver. There was little time that she had left.
Lacking the motivation to keep trying for the first-aid kit, Patricia decided to instead watch the sky above her. She knew that there was no point in fighting the inevitable, as there was no one for miles and miles around her, and the only people who had an approximate location on her were long gone, probably happy to be at a great distance from her. The finality of her situation brought a strange sense of clarity as if she just dunked her head in ice-cold water.
A lone tear rolled down the side of her face. Little that clarity could do for her then. She had realized that she had been fooled, twice, but only when it was too late. Funny, how things work.
Time began to move faster and faster, the light of day fading away as the skies darkened and the shapes of trees lost their acute edges. Patricia realized that the final dregs of her consciousness began to slip away. Soon, she will pass out, for one last time. Not that it mattered, she was too tired anyway. Too tired of running, too tired of fighting, too tired of being angry.
Very faint sounds of footsteps approached her somewhere from her right. If this happened earlier, she might have moved her head enough to see who or what had approached, but she was past that point. Her vision began to fade into absolute darkness, her consciousness following in tow. She was losing her grip on reality, so she did not care for whatever it was that went her way. However, right before her final waking moment, she heard someone speak.
“Wow, they really did a number on you…”
* * *
Patricia did not recall drinking as much as she must have, considering the absolute monster of a hangover she felt while she desperately clawed her way out of the alcohol-induced deep sleep. She must have done quite a few rowdy acts before she passed out too, if the monumental pain in the rest of her body was anything to go by. Strange, that. She never allowed herself to slip like that, not since when she first entered civilian life.
As she slowly began to come to, her groggy theorizing about the activities of the preceding night took a sharp turn, and not for the better. With her senses returning akin to a slowly booting computer, she felt a very snug fit around her left wrist, as if some sort of a bracelet was attached to her. Lazily, she tried to move her left arm, only to realize that she could not.
She opened her eyes as fast as she could, but to her surprise, even that action was incredibly difficult. No normal drink would do that much, not to her. Light began to pour into her pupils, but it was of a mercifully low intensity, so she was not overwhelmed like she thought she would be. Yet, as things came into focus at a snail’s pace, she wished that there was a ton of light and overwhelming sensation instead of what she saw.
A prison cell. She was located in a prison cell, and by the looks of it, one that was underground. Everything was still incredibly fuzzy, to Patricia’s great annoyance, but she knew a cell when she saw one. With a grunt, she turned her head slightly to the side in hopes of capturing more of her surroundings. This task turned out to be more difficult than she thought, her head feeling like a hundred-pound weight instead of a natural part of her body. With very slight movements, she began to fight against the weakness that permeated her muscles.
“I was wondering if you would wake up or not, but I should have known better,” a voice sounded off somewhere in front of her. It sounded gruff, on a deeper side. Most likely belonging to a male.
Her other senses finally began to return to function. With a twitching nose, she sniffed the air, getting a lung full of musty and damp air, mixed with a distinct scent of a human body. Wherever she was, her interlocutor had been present within her vicinity long enough to fill the area with his smell.
“Ahh, look at that nose go!” the human said, a note of glee in his voice. “Remarkable, your kind is. Such resilience, even in the face of negligent chances of survival.”
Although the basal functions of her body were returning under her control, she could do little to fight her anemic slab of a tongue. That would take some time, as simply opening her mouth seemed to require an inordinate amount of conscious effort.
“I would wait on that one if I were you,” the human cautioned. “You were in a coma for about three weeks, and then in a medically-induced coma for another four days. I am not sure if you can even understand me, to be honest. You lost a titanic amount of blood before I found you, and I had to give you an elephant’s dose of anesthetic earlier. By all accounts, you should have serious brain damage.”
Well, that did not sound reassuring at all. A coma? Anesthetics? A prison? As more awareness of her situation slowly trickled into her mind, Patricia found a rising sense of dread. Things seemed to get worse and worse at an exponential rate.
“Huh, so you do understand me. Perhaps not the best way to go about breaking the news, but I needed to see if you were still cognizant or not,” the human continued, seeing her ears perk up a tad bit more. “I did not want to waste any more of my time or resources on you if you turned out to be a vegetable.”
Another slew of scents assailed her senses. This time, they were more sophisticated and delicate, letting Patricia know that the human before her dabbled in chemicals and gunpowder quite often. Her vision sharpened enough for her to make out the details of the human’s form, so she wasted no time boring her eyes into him. A well-built man in his late thirties sat at a small desk before the thickly-barred frontal wall of her cell. He was wearing military-green cargo pants, old military boots, and a yellowed tank top. His head was adorned with long, dark-brown hair and it seemed to be tied in a ponytail behind his shoulders, but very little of it could be seen from Patricia’s angle.
What genuinely drew Patricia’s attention were the numerous scars that the man’s exposed skin bore. Starting from his arms, which were crossed at his chest, and hands, she could see countless tracks of smooth and jagged lines make their way up and across his skin, interrupted by round indents of healed-over bullet holes every so often. Once at his shoulders, she saw a tell-tale sign of a deep bite mark on his right shoulder: a claiming bite that many anthros used to mark their mates.
“I want to…” she rasped, momentarily surprised by how hoarse her voice sounded. “I want to speak… Speak to your wife…”
“My wife? What…” his voice sounded confused, but he quickly regained his composure. “Oh, you saw the mark on my shoulder. No, I have no wife, I am afraid you will be speaking just with me.”
That response drew Patricia’s attention to the human’s face. Although less densely packed, the scars still left their mark on his face as well. Several small, but protracted shapes bound his overall physiognomy in an irregular pattern. Shrapnel marks.
“Then explain to me… Why am I… Bound like convict?!” Patricia managed to give off a weak snarl, rage bubbling up to replace her initial sense of dread. Since her consciousness had mostly returned by that point, an intense sense of indignation dominated her mind at the reaffirmed realization that her left wrist was shackled.
To add insult to injury, she was seated on the ground, her left wrist slightly elevated from the ground. Both of her legs were affixed to the ground with similar shackles as well, keeping her locked in the sitting position.
“Because I have no clue what to expect out of you, and I do not want to take any chances,” the man said, leaning back in his chair.
This wasn’t a normal situation. Even in her groggy state, Patricia could tell that she was in a delicate position that required a more dextrous approach.
“Why are you afraid… Of me? I don’t know you, a-and I… I did nothing wrong to you,” in order to buy some time to get her bearings, she decided to lean into her physical condition and think about her next steps.
“You are Patricia Birch, an ATF agent, and a servant of the State. I do not need to know you personally in order to be wary,” he grumbled, interlocking his fingers and placing his hands in his lap.
Patricia squinted to look at the center of the human’s face. She could see a stern, heavy expression looking back at her with an ice-cold disposition. His green eyes were not much better as they bit into her own akin to an uncompromising grip of an industrial vice.
“And you know that… H-h-how?” something told her he knew much more about her than that.
“Your belt contained your credentials,” he said matter-of-factly, his face still a hunk of derisive flesh. “That, and I heard your name over the radio transmissions that suddenly permeated this area before I found you. Quite the ruckus you and yours made here. The whole place lit up like a Christmas tree out of nowhere.”
“Then why did you n-not contact…” she had to stop and take a deep breath since doing just about anything besides breathing seemed to take a tremendous amount of energy. “Contact local authorities? Are you… A doctor?”
She went to move her right arm and another discovery struck her with an immense force: her arm was in a sling of bandage, tightly adhered to her abdomen such that it was affixed in a motionless manner. This kind of a sling is usually reserved for cases when even the slightest of disturbances to a healing limb may result in permanent disrepair. Then, the events preceding her alleged coma began flooding back in a sudden, unrelenting stream.
“I see you are starting to remember what happened to you,” the human said grimly, his right arm moving from his lap to rest on the table before him. “You were a step away from being exsanguinated, both from your shoulder and from internal trauma. I dragged you back here and performed rudimentary surgery to try and salvage your arm, as well as pumping you full of fluids to bring you out of hypovolemic shock.”
Patricia went slack-jawed from astonishment brought on by what he was saying. Indeed, she remembered how she battled with another human and a wolfess, hellbent on apprehending the former and skinning the latter. She also remembered the impact that a shotgun slug made with her right shoulder and the smaller punches of the SKS rounds against her chest and abdomen.
“I cannot tell whether or not I was able to save the usage of your right arm, but at least I have done enough to keep you on the mortal plane,” the human continued, noticing the mental struggle painted on her face. “That, and I suppose I did you an inadvertent favor…”
He raised his right hand, showing a small something clutched in his fingers. Patricia squinted to get a closer look at what he was presenting: a small, black cube was neatly nestled between his thumb and three other fingers.
“The little fucker could function like a beacon, so I had to take it out and silence it since it was most likely rigged to work in conjunction with your body,” he said, turning the cube so he could inspect it. “As I dug into it though, I was surprised by the sheer complexity of its integration. Did you know that this thing had graphite nanowires running to your heart, spine, and brain? I was very close to just frying the thing as soon as it was out, but now I am interested in learning more about it.”
It was clear that Patricia was not dealing with some run-of-the-mill bystander - the cube he was parading was most likely her behavior chip. A quiet gasp escaped her maw as she followed the small device with her eyes, trying to comprehend how that was taken out of her. The more this man spoke, the more she was convinced that she was jailed by a State enemy, possibly a rebel, who had enough brain power to deal with sophisticated technology like the chip.
“S-seems that you are not exactly… A State-licensed doctor,” she said with a shade of sarcasm in her voice.
The man regarded her silently for a moment. His gaze dug into her with stern efficiency, as if he were a hunter who was studying his prey. All in all, he was behaving extremely calmly for someone who had an ATF agent captive, which made Patricia question the chances of her being rescued any time soon.
“Has anyone told you… That staring is c-considered a challenge?” Patricia said, disliking the intensity of the human’s stare.
“Cut the shit, Patricia,” the man suddenly barked, getting up from his seat and walking in front of the table such that only the bars of the cell were between him and her. Patricia noticed that on the man’s right side was a holster, with a handle to some unknown firearm peeking out. Her ears involuntarily perked up once she saw the gun, but she tried her best to hide that small motion.
“Well, if you are not a f-fan of small talk… Can you tell me why I a-am here? And who you are, while you are at it?” she was still fighting with her mouth, but there was steady progress as her speech slowly lost the slurring and she needed to take shorter breaks in between her words.
He ignored her questions, simply looking behind him and reaching for something. After a moment, he produced an old-looking file folder and opened it; he took out a small stack of papers before setting the folder back down. As Patricia watched his movements, she noticed more detail about the room behind him, her vision almost entirely back to its full capacity.
To her temporary relief, the place did not seem like a torture dungeon or even an executioner’s quarters. Besides her cell, built in a rather unorthodox fashion even by human standards, the spacious room they resided in looked more like a miniature workshop. Lining the steel-reinforced concrete walls were machines of various ages and functions, all targeted for medium to large industrial production. Thanks to her firearms experience, Patricia quickly deduced that these machines are used for weapon manufacturing, and judging by the amount and variety present, this room alone could create most pre-integration, mass-production human weapons.
“Patricia A. Birch: ATF Sergeant, serving in the 11th subsector of the WCS sector under the Anthro-Guided World Regulatory Commission,” the human read off, flipping over one of the papers he held and showing her a personal file with her name on it. “Although you have had a spotless service record and a quota that will make even the most rabid State zealot blush, you have not received any outstanding commendations or awards in the last six to seven years.”
His dictation snapped Patricia’s attention back to him in a flash. Out of all the things she could have expected him to have in that folder, her personal file was not one of them.
The man flipped a few pages over, running his eyes back and forth as if searching for a specific line. “You are noted to be extremely violent and impulsive in certain situations, particularly concerning those of State coherency. Your chipping is recorded too, with an accompanying psychiatric evaluation when you were honorably discharged from military service around ten years ago.”
“How… Where the fuck d-did you get that?” she asked slowly and quietly, her ears fully trained on him and her eyes wide with bewilderment. This human was reading through records that only the highest State officials had access to.
“Your kinsfolk, no matter how well-suited they are in all things physical, were never known to produce inordinately smart individuals,” he replied calmly, lowering the papers enough such that his eyes were visible to her again; he was looking at her with great scrutiny. “At least in my eyes. I am yet to meet an anthro that can convince me of the contrary.”
“You should v-visit the Comm… Commis…” she spat, her tongue refusing to handle the transition between an m and an s for some reason. “Damn! You s-should visit the Commission HQ then. Plenty of smarts th-there.”
Most of the time, humans visited the aforementioned HQ as high-profile criminals in lieu of trials that were to be of a more clandestine nature. Whether or not the human picked up on her veiled threat remained to be seen, but she could not let him insult her people and get off scot-free.
“No need to. Even up there, your IT specialists are really fucking bad at their jobs,” he flicked the papers in his hands, giving off a slight grin. “I have been digging around in their data and communications channels to my heart’s content for a few years now and they have not even caught a whiff of my presence.”
“Are you s-saying that you’ve been… Spying on the top-secret info ch-channels? That’s a hefty c-crime, not an achievement!” the Shepherd felt a twinge of indignation at the notion that a single human could do such a thing. She would not have believed a word that he said had he not produced her record earlier.
“I wouldn’t call that an achievement too,” he chuckled, taking out another paper and turning it around such that she could see it. “Does this bring back memories, Mistress of Arms from the Sixth Regiment?”
If she was not truly disturbed before, she sure as hell was now. This was a copy of her psych eval, one that he mentioned but she hoped was not included in his possession. The fact that he had access to it only further supported the fact that he indeed had access to some deeply buried things.
What is even more disturbing is that the top of the presented piece of paper had a huge red stamp on it that indicated access restriction. Patricia guessed that it was labeled to be for private use by a psychologist only, and she involuntarily squirmed in her seat at the notion of hearing what that document contained.
“There we go, now we are making some headway in that thick armor of yours,” there was genuine pride in his tone, as a broad smile decorated his lips. “This thing has some fun facts written about you, including general instability, endangerment of officers, implicit threats of violence, et cetera. Here, it also states that you have been found wanting in your physical abilities, which made you unfit for general duty. Seems to me that Big Sis decided that you were too old and therefore no longer necessary. How does that make you feel, to be discarded on a whim by the same entity in which you find your life’s purpose?”
“I’ve n-nothing against it, you fetishist bastard!” she snarled viciously, trying to lunge from her position with little result. “I bet you loved reading up everything about me, yah? All the juicy details of my life… T-trying to find some way to get to me, or even better, to get into my pants. I bet you have been fantasizing about that ever since…”
“If I had any interest of that nature, don’t you think I would have satisfied my curiosity while you were out cold?” he asked darkly, his face now an emotionless mask. “I expected this reaction, no individual likes to feel their crutches be knocked out from under her.”
He put the psych-eval sheet away, flipping through a few more papers in the file.
“Where things get very interesting is in your military service record. I did not know that they had such a banal tendency to copy off others,” he said in a snarky tone, regaining his taunting demeanor. “I mean, look at this! Not an ounce of creativity. Your training consisted of a crude patch-work of different methodologies appropriated from multiple nations, and some of these are extremely dated. You say that your precious little State actually has smart anthros in it, but all I see thus far is absolute idiocy and incom…”
“I’m going to fucking kill you! I’ll tear you into pieces! Rip you apart bit by bit, you skin monkey! Fuckin’ shitless humie, a skin sack of bone and bullshit!” she roared and thrashed against her restraints, her ears pinned back and maw open in a murderous scowl. As she growled her threats, copious amounts of saliva began to foam at her mandible from the sheer intensity of her reaction.
When she heard his incessant insults being hurled at the State, something in her mind short-circuited. As much as she tried to keep her composure, between the psych-eval and this, the human managed to push her most sensitive buttons and she could no longer contain herself. She braced against an inevitable shocking sensation at the base of her neck, but it never came, giving her carte blanche for letting her anger out.
Without batting an eye, the man reached for his holstered weapon in a lightning-fast motion, drawing out what looked like a massive slab of metal. Patricia only caught a glimpse of the thing before it fired, but it was enough time for her to reflexively put her ears up.
The gun went off in a thunderous, explosive fashion. The muzzle flash it produced was much bigger than any handgun or ordinary rifle could make, indicating an extremely hot round, a high caliber, or both. Patricia did not think about that, however, as she felt a searing pain in her left ear, followed by a disorienting blast of sound and a strong impact of debris on the back of her head. The round sheared off one-third of her ear, impacting the concrete wall behind her and exploding in a shower of tiny chips in all directions.
An eternity seemed to pass before anyone moved. Patricia sat still, the shock of what just transpired enough to knock her out of the rage. The man, on the other hand, stood still, his eyes studying her while his right hand held the massive firearm, smoke still billowing from its barrel. It seemed physically impossible for him to fire something that powerful and that big without turning his wrist into mush, but he did not seem to care one bit.
“This is your one and only warning. React like that again, say anything like that again, and I will not flinch a second time,” he said in a grave tone, locking eyes with her.
“W-was it necessary to mutilate my e-ear?” she grumbled as the pain from her ear and the back of her head began to set in, together with the trickling blood down the left side of her head. The slight slur of her speech returned as her rage abated, depriving her of the adrenaline-fueled coordination she enjoyed while hurling insults at the man.
Despite the shock her jailor so graciously provided, the anger that filled her entire being moments ago was still present, if in a more ephemeral manner. What she definitely learned from the situation was that her life is in a questionable position, therefore her earlier, cautious approach was more than justified.
“Should not have raised them,” he replied, flipping the gun such that its muzzle pointed down and holstering it in one, fluid motion. “Did you enjoy the experience of my pistol?”
His question was laden with vicious mockery as he glowered at her with dominant poise. Clearly, he was proud of the weapon in his possession.
“I’ve worked w-with firearms for almost as long as I have been alive, and I’ve never seen, or… Felt a-anything like it,” she asked with genuine interest. Maybe this was some sort of a new design that rebels have appropriated, or maybe it was a rare model of a pre-integration weapon. Either way, she was eager to find out more about it as the info could serve as great intel. Might as well find some liver lining in the shit sandwich she has been dealt.
Yet, as she spoke, she felt much more winded than moments prior. Her little escapade with the thrashing and yelling did not go unnoticed by her recovering body, leaving her in a very pained and fatigued state. Furthermore, the calmer she got, the more she felt the fatigue set in as the adrenaline left her circulation. She really needed to reign in her emotions, at least while her body was running on fumes.
“No wonder you didn’t. This pistol is of my design and manufacture. It fires a grenade fitted to the size of a 700 nitro express round,” he pointed to her, and then to the wall behind her. “It was a nightmare to design because it requires an active recoil compensation system such that it does not break my arm each time I fire it, but it was necessary. With this in my possession, not even the biggest polar bear can draw breath after two or three rounds to the chest.”
If his description was anything to go by, what he said was accurate. With the power of the payload that he was brandishing on his hip, he could tear apart any anthro with ease, despite any armor that she wore. Patricia wondered if even a full-body bomb defusal suit could stop a volley from that monstrosity. It did not even bear thinking about how the impact of the bullet felt, considering that a ten-gage slug nearly amputated her limb, and that was a non-explosive round.
“Don’t you think that’s… A little excessive? I only s-sparsely have seen 700 nitro express, and those things are… More than powerful enough to take down even the biggest anthros. Why add the e-e-explosives?” whoever that man was, if what he claimed was true, he must have been a weapon engineering marvel, for such a design sounded like something out of a sci-fi thriller.
“Rich, coming from an anthro, to admonish me about dangers of excess,” the man chuckled ominously. “I needed something that, in the heat of the moment, could stop the raging beasts that some of your sistren can be.”
He bent down, picking up the papers he dropped moments before firing his gun and dusting them off.
“L-look… I know that you want to be this big and scary humie who c-carries a m-mass… Massive shooter, but before you bore any deeper and tear my whole f-f-fucking life apart, can I at least know your name?” there was exasperation intermingled with a deep sense of fatigue in Patricia’s tone; she was becoming exhausted from the conversation.
The human paused, searching her face with his scrying gaze. This time, however, his eyes seemed to gain a modicum of warmth to them.
“Anton,” he uttered, quieter than before. “Anton Smolensky. Now, what I wanted to say before you so rudely interrupted me is that I sympathize with you for what the State did.”
“I don’t n-need your pity…” despite the surprise that his words were, Patricia looked away from him, her ears drooping. “I didn’t exactly get a say in the matter… B-but I did my duty and s-served the State, just like any anthro should!”
As she spoke, her voice got louder and more forceful, her last words sounding more akin to a battle cry. Her eyes returned to Anton, now filled with a defiant spark. Whatever modicum of strength she had left, she poured it into fighting for the name of the State. If not through anger, then through defiance she will defend the State, as is her duty.
“You know what I think?” as he said this, Patricia opened her mouth for an immediate response, but he continued before she could get anything out. “I think that you were a naïve little pup who sought glory in battle, much like any young individual would when she is conscripted and forced into battle. Yet, you danced along with great fervor, happy for the attention from the glorious leaders of your people.”
Anton slowly walked over to the cell’s gate, crouching down so that he could be on the same eye level as Patricia. As he lowered himself, she finally noticed that he was about a foot shorter than her, making him a specimen of impressive stature among human men by all accounts.
“And they were all the happier to use your enthusiasm in creating a perfect tool for the use in the barbaric subjugation that they called ‘integration,’” he seethed through clenched teeth, glaring somewhere just past Patricia’s head. “Then, once you started to show signs of wear and tear, as depicted in your eval, they booted you out to do some piffle job in the ass-end of nowhere.”
She squirmed, closing her eyes with a ragged sigh. Every fiber in her being wanted to lash out at him and make him shut up most brutally for daring to speak like that. Instead, she clung onto the pain in her ear and the still-present ringing in her skull as a reminder that no matter how much anger roiled inside her, she was granted a second chance at life. She should not be so eager to throw it away so soon.
“Yet, to my personal surprise, I saw that you have not taken a single man as a ‘war trophy,’ even though you had plenty of chances.” he scowled at the thought, still looking slightly away from Patricia.
He went silent for a moment, contemplating something buried deep in his memory. His eyes stared off into the distance, moving ever so often from side to side. Little did he know about her and what guided her actions when she was a soldier. Unlike many of her sistren, she did not fancy herself as a mindless beast, hell-bent on plugging herself with the first male in sight, but that thought process was seemingly far beyond the human before her.
“The State broke you down so that they could mold their perfect soldier from the shards,” Anton spoke up, his tone relaxed once more and his eyes returning to look at Patricia’s face. “They took so much from you, just to reward you by kicking you out of the only place where you felt welcomed, not to mention how they stuck you with a behavior chip. You fervently defend the State as this benevolent entity not because of actual love and devotion, but because it was the only thing left to justify everything that was done to you. Without holding onto it, you would go insane from all of the trauma you endured.”
Her mind reacted to what Anton said as if it agreed with him without her conscious knowledge, making her twinge in disgust. This human was surely using some sort of a psychological tactic on her, given that he had all of the winning cards in the form of her personal file. No, this had to stop, and the sooner, the better.
“How d-dare you speak… Of these things!? What could y-you possibly… Know of s-service and devotion?” she opened her eyes to peer back at him, trying her best not to slump from the rapidly growing fatigue. “You’re just another… Hide-out dwelling prick… Who speaks in high platitudes a-about… something he can’t… E-even fathom!”
“When I told you my last name, I was surprised you did not recognize it. I guess the high brass did not plaster my face all over the walls on this continent,” he said with barely any inflection in his voice.
Standing up, he assumed a well-practiced stance, that of an officer overlooking his men.
“Colonel Anton Smolensky, one of the officers who led the Yugoslavian resistance,” he declared in an authoritative tone, as if speaking to a regiment of soldiers. “I saw the integration begin in my country as a young officer, and I felt it end as a battered, scarred man with little left to live for. The men who served under me all perished as we escaped the final pursuit given by the State.”
He ran his hand over the bite mark on his right shoulder, giving off a low groan.
“If anthros did not have a tendency to gloat after thinking themselves to be the absolute victor, I would not be here today,” his look was forlorn and his voice hollow. “I served my people and my country until it’s very last moments, throwing away any and all things personal for the cause. I know of what you speak better than you realize.”
A moment of silence fell between them, as they stared into each other’s eyes.
“W-why… Am… I alive?” Patricia finally broke the tense atmosphere that congealed around them. “You s-should… Have executed me… On the spot. What… D-do you… Want from me?”
This man did not give off an impression of a bleeding heart. Clearly, there was some sort of ulterior motive behind his actions, and Patricia wanted to know what was in store for her before she passed out from exhaustion.
“Here’s how this will work,” Anton replied, leaning onto the table with his arms crossed on his chest. “The shackles that bind you are remotely operated. Since I do not trust you with anything even remotely close to autonomy, every time I am in the room, you will have to be sitting as you are. To answer the inevitable question of ‘and if I don’t’: I am the one who will bring your food down here and tend to your still healing wounds. If you don’t comply, you will get no food or medical care, simple as that.”
He reached for the papers strewn on the desk behind him and collected all of them into the folder he originally showed to her. As he turned around, she saw the full extent of his ponytail, which was more akin to a fox’s tail with how fluffy it was past the binding. How he got it to look like that, Patricia did not know.
“There are cameras set up around this room, and the door that leads out is designed to withstand multiple, direct rocket blasts, so you will not be able to escape no matter what you do. Your only option is to listen to me and cooperate, starve to death, or die from an infection,” once he had the folder neatly tucked in the nook of his arm he headed towards the aforementioned exit. “We will get back to this conversation later. I have more questions about you and your past.”
“A-are you… S-seriously just going… To ignore me?” Patricia snarled, thrashing against her binds with renewed vigor, all for one final push. “Answer my question, you damn bastard!”
Her cries were ignored. Anton strolled out of the massive door and it automatically closed behind him, leaving Patricia by herself. A few moments later, her shackles opened with a loud snap.
Slumping over to her uninjured side, Patricia was not entirely sure she was back in the world of the living, as things sure did seem like she landed herself in purgatory. And it played up to be a very, very long stay.