Night Hunter Nation

Selene wasn’t a stranger to Coyle’s cruelty, but for whatever reason he seemed to really have it out for her today. He seemed lucid, which scared her more than anything.

The sound of his boots pounding on the Police Station tile after her skyrocketed her heart rate to unhealthy levels as she skidded around a corner. Running. She was good at running. Hiding, too—unless it was Night Hunter. She was a mouse, after all. Мышь. She’d memorized it—would he be proud of her?

Coyle’s baton slams into the wall somewhere near her back. Too close. She screams out of reflex and practically tears the nearest door off the hinges to get it open, then slams it shut behind her. Leans her body back against it. Wait, the lock—

The door comes flying open again and she skids across the tile, landing on her belly. Pain shoots through her face and limbs—she’s cracked her knees on the floor, her elbows—everything was buzzing with hurt. 

A different kind of buzzing fills her head as Coyle saunters into the room, tapping his stun baton along the counter. They’d ended up in the laboratory room, fully lit and nowhere to hide. 

Selene scrambles backwards until she hits another door, practically hyperventilating. “O-Officer, did I—do something? I-I’m sorry, I don’t…”

“Oh, you ain’t sorry yet. But yer gunna be,” Coyle drawls, every syllable dripping with venom. She didn’t understand why he hated her so much.

“Jezebel,” He sneers, and then slips a hand into the pocket of his jacket. Selene flinches, as if something could be even worse than the baton in his other hand, and then blinks as he throws something at her. Polaroids? 

She hates to take her eyes off of him for even a second, but he seems content to play this scenario out with her, so with shaking fingers she picks up one of the photos. And immediately blanches. It’s of Sova and her—being intimate. Where did these even come from?

Coyle says something else, but she can’t even hear him over the ringing in her own ears, her vision narrowing to the photograph clutched in her sweaty fingers. It was embarrassing. She was angry that she was embarrassed. She wasn’t really used to being angry, and that made her feel… something.

“Commie got yer tongue?”

The acrid reek of smoke suddenly grows strong enough to distract her, and she barely has time to react before the glowing end of Coyle’s cigarette meets her arm. She yelps in surprise, and for once in her life in Sinyala, she reacts by kicking him. The cop seems just as surprised as she is, but she can still see him grinning again as she stumbles away from him, how his grip minutely loosens to allow her to leave.

Selene is hyperventilating by the time she staggers into the Evidence room. Leaning hard against a book shelf, she grips one of the shelves, the cheap wood threatening to splinter even from her weak grip. This was too much. Too much, but she had to finish it, she didn’t know how much longer Easterman and Murkoff would tolerate her—

The sound of ragged breathing nearly makes her pass out until she fully registers it. Night Hunter. There was always a chance that it wasn’t Sova, but she was willing to risk it.

The familiar green glow of his goggles swims into her vision, and he tilts his head, snarling softly. 

“Мышь. What are you doing?”

She sinks back against the bookcase from relief and shudders. “Coyle got me, but instead of frying me he just… showed me some pictures. Indecent pictures. O-of me and, um—-“

“Pictures? Are they pictures of you with other men?” His fingers wrap around her forearm, tugging her closer, and he chuckles. “No, of course not… no one else could tolerate you.”

“Aren’t you… angry? It’s an invasion of privacy…” Selene mutters, already knowing it was the wrong thing to say as his fingers tighten on her arm.

“Invasion of—“ Night Hunter trails off, muttering to himself in Russian. His grip tightens until it hurts, but she doesn’t dare try to pull away. 

“Invasion of privacy тупая сука… Do you know what invasion is? This shit they screwed into my fucking head!” He snarls, his accent growing stronger from irritation.

Selene blanches and looks away. He always made her feel stupid, but he was right, wasn’t he? Compared to what Murkoff had done to him, her issues weren’t that bad…

His grip lessens a fraction and he goes quiet. Looking back to the Ex-Pop, she watches as he tilts her arm, seemingly focused on the cigarette burn now. Her stomach lurches.

“What is this, мышь?” He inquires, his voice suddenly unnervingly calm. To his vision, the burn was still glowing with residual heat. Like a brand. The cop had branded his property.

She starts to say something, but he straightens to his full height and shoves her into the front of a storage cabinet, the handles of the doors digging into her back.

“You let him touch you. Brand you. Did you enjoy it, Шмара? Do you think it’s going to save you?” 

The cold fury in his voice was slurring his words. Selene didn’t know what to say, and that probably made her seem even more guilty. The fact that he would just assume that about her… she felt tears at the corners of her eyes. 

“S-sova, I would never…” She licks her dry lips and trails off as he raises his machete and places the blade against her arm, just above the “brand”.

The sound of the recirculated air in the office was suddenly too loud. She couldn’t truly make out Night Hunter’s eyes, but somehow she knew he was staring at her with whatever he had left behind his goggles. 

“Do you love me, мышь?” He suddenly drawls, the anger in his voice replaced with manic glee as he digs the blade into her arm. He hadn’t sharpened it in a few days.

Selene clenches her jaw but nods, even as her stomach flips. He was going to cut her arm off and she was going to let him. Stupid. Her life was a waste, so it was fitting that her death would be too. 

The sudden sharp tang of blood interrupts her thoughts and she grits her teeth as she feels the blade of his machete start to dig further into her arm. Judging by how dull it felt, she’d probably die from blood loss before he even finished. 

As he begins to cut, all she can think of is that fake Jesus from the Orphanage. Sometimes the saw seems dull and she has to listen to his screams longer. Selene doesn’t scream, if only because she knows it won’t help anything. Because her mind is partially somewhere else as this deranged man (she hated using those kinds of words but what else could she say???) tries to cut her fucking arm off.

A single piece of her flesh sloughs off, where the cigarette burn was, and he stops. She’s on one knee now, and her head is spinning. Mouth dry. Night Hunter licks a stripe along her arm, over the raw wound, then shoves her to the floor. 

“You’re lucky that I still need you to have both arms.”

He steps over her body as if she’s nothing, disappearing into the one of the offices. Selene just lays there, face wet with tears as she cries silently to herself, arm throbbing. She moves her now good hand to the release valve of her Heal rig and lets out just enough vapor for the pain to stop, to let her sit up again. She blinks hard, her head spinning again. 

Night Hunter approaches her again and she thinks she might be hallucinating, or maybe it’s a different one, but the sudden smell of antiseptic-soaked bandages makes her nose itch. He wraps her arm in silence, and she squirms a bit from the burn, but he hisses at her and she does her best to stay still. 

“Thank you, Sova,” She mumbles, even though she knows she shouldn’t. He doesn’t answer as he ties the bandages off tight enough to hurt, then drops her arm as if scalded by it. 

“Next time I’ll take a finger,” He rumbles, then hauls her upwards by the back of her shirt. “Finish this shit and stay away from that сука свинья.”

Selene stumbles a bit, but nods. She didn’t like Coyle at all, but it wasn’t as if saying that would do any good.