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Smoke and Ashes: Part 9 - Good Behaviour

Finally I got around to actually editing some of my NaNoWriMo endevours. It’s not been quite long enough that I’ve forgotten what’s happened, although there was a few points of “oh yeah! That!”.

Once again, is also on Wattpad. (And Part 8, for anyone forgetting what happened.)

Title: Part 9: Good behaviour Setting: AJCO: Smoke and Ashes. (State past) Warnings: Mentions: Gore, suicide, blood, character death. Summary: Vachan recieves an unexpected package, and S_R has concerns about his personal connections to the current situation. Characters: Dr Vachan; S_R; Thorne; Archer. Words: 5600

-

The next few days pass in a daze, a half-focused blurring of mundane and the memorial, as I try to align myself with this abruptly-diminished world. Jocelyn is not the first person I have lost, not the only friend taken early and without warning into the dark – and it is not even the most horrific manner of exit I have witnessed. There are far more drawn-out methods of death in this City of ours, waiting just beyond the hairsbreadths of mistake, miscalculation or raw misfortune. And I have enough betrayal in my past, known enough passion turned to poison, that even F'ess culpability is not entirely unexpected.

Becoming involved with a Ward is never simple, and on the surface there is little surprising about this. It is debauchery gone bloody – as declared in both the sensationalistic exclamations of the Civilian press, and the smug, iron-clad hubris of Official channels alike – yet I can see nothing else but the towering shadow of what is missing. Jocelyn would not have taken a Loyalist as a lover, even in jest, and F'ess had seemed far from that.

Her. After you? No. No, there's something else here.

The words echo in my mind, uncomfortably close to my own suspicions yet so intrusive, and with a snide edge that they had lacked in their reality. I am aware that the acid I feel at thoughts of the skunk-haired Captain is not entirely fair, but there is a black fury bubbling beneath my heart, and it has nowhere else to turn right now.

Where do his loyalties lie? Morrigan has her shadow around him, and that does seem firm enough. She clearly does not think him likely to work against her, or my questions over his presence would be very swiftly nulled. I have seen her reaction to perfidy amongst her favoured. Your Auditor Knows, after all – and ours is grey-iron exemplar of that fact. I know that. I know that, with the unshakable certainty that has underlain over half my life. But I cannot release my suspicion of that man, that Ward, who has become so oddly present in my world of late.

Yet, how different can I claim myself to be? How many of my own choices, my own actions in this half-owned life, have been truly my own since I took my place at the fore of that strange collection?

Everything is a tool, Asha. To think otherwise is comfortable delusion at best, and dangerous arrogance at its core.

I stare at the desk console screen in front of me, sightless, as the surgery schedule for this week scrolls past my diverted attention. I have been signed off my active duties for an enforced minimum of five days, despite my assurance to Director Martha Drake – CYFAC's Primary Facilitator for the last eight years, and a woman who certainly makes up for her lack of visible augmentations with the uncompromising steel that may well run in her blood – that I am fit for duties, and I find myself unwilling to press the matter more than a cursory attempt. Much of my collaboration with Jocelyn was official enough that the Director knew of it, and there never seemed a reason to conceal our friendship even when she left our walls.

'Compassionate leave', the clerical staff call it. I am uncertain how far I agree with the exact description, but I try to force my focus back to the task at hand: designating temporary replacements. All except the most complex neurological work can be easily shifted off to colleagues in other specialisations, and by some cold serendipity there are few of those active cases at the moment.

Well. There is Morrigan and the neurological filigree that resides within her skull. My ongoing assessments of her integration progress are all but complete now – other than long-term monitoring – and I certainly cannot hand that over to anyone else. Work on the latest iteration of the Quartermaster system is highly classified, even within the Audit Office itself, and considering that it was the first version of that system which earned me my second Audit process, it is not an area that I can easily find temporary cover for. Nor would I want to.

I pause, as my gaze unlocks again from the digital listings on screen and rises back up the laden shelves beside the desk to find the Argus model that sits there. It was never an attractive craft, and even the innate charm of small replicas has difficulty with something that resembles a tumourous metal cigar more than much else. The deck is swollen outward and the flanks of the boat seem to bulge, where retrofit of the colossal database banks of the QMSystem required more mundane ship storage to be slung down the sides like saddlebags. So many of its lines are distorted, and even the sensor array that replaced the main gun batteries bristles awkwardly from its centre. I have never had my mother's flare for aesthetics, and I cared little how my requested modifications to the base vessel were implemented.

If appearance had been the only thing I had overlooked, I wonder, what different course would my legacy be carving now?

The beep of my door seems surprisingly harsh, breaking the rising cocoon of darkened thoughts, and I blink.

"Open."

I half-expect to see Cesar's familiar bulk easing in to the room, but the repaired door slides back to reveal Thorne's quite different figure. She steps inside quickly, glancing around with slightly-wide eyes as if checking for unexpected onlookers, before hurrying over to my desk.

"I'm sorry to intrude, Doctor Vachan." Her voice shakes, with that nervous lilt she gets when she has something important to say. "But – I thought you'd want to know. Soon as possible. And not through the – the normal route, because I don't know if it's being watched and you said to be careful, and I wasn't sure how secure the comms are after – everything – " She cuts off, waving one hand broadly and rapidly around at the room, as her eyebrows wriggle furiously. The small silver nubs of her communication implants are bright against the brown skin of her throat, and she presses her hand over them, looking conspiratorial for a moment. Then worried.

"If that's alright? I wasn't sure – I don't want to – "

"Thorne," I say, sharply but not unkindly. The girl is one of my best technicians and has quite the bedside gift, but she gets caught in her own words at times of urgency. "What's the matter?"

Some of the nervousness in her expression is getting to me, and I cannot help but remember that the last time I heard her worried, there were armed Militiamen heading for my door.

She stops, giving a small nod before reaching into the uniform jacket held tight against her side, and withdraws a small package.

"This came for you. I mean, it came a few days ago but it's not specifically addressed to you, so it went into the general security backlog and they only just scanned it – and I'd put a flag in the system for anything that is a bit odd. And, well..." She stops again and turns the parcel towards me, tapping one corner. The top layer of the waxed paper wrapping has been pulled away there, exposing a symbol in thin foil sandwiched between the layers. Four sharp-angled lines, a little like a highly-stylised arrow with the head inverted – and I know it well. An Audit Office internal security stamp, indicating that the contents were likely to be considered well above the paygrade of anyone trying to run them through a security scanner.

A25 has a very familiar symbol.

And yet, there is a strangeness to this stamp. It is much larger than usual, for one thing, and official stamps are not generally hidden. I have sent marked envelopes myself – in my more Remitted duties in relation to that Office – and if anything the metallic symbols are usually ominously understated but displayed clear in the centre of the envelope. This one has been concealed, and...

Suspicion rising, I carefully dig a nail under the symbol and peel it back. It moves too easily, and after a moment of staring at the yellow-blue pattern that is embossed on the reverse, I feel my heart flutter.

'If there's one thing better than a pick-me-up, Asha dear – it's an illicit pick-me-up.'

I am not the only one who makes use of the good Captain's unWardly attitude towards contraband, and I remember distinctly the bright foil packaging that comes on Jocelyn's favoured brand of dubiously-legal chocolate.

Thorne has just drawn breath to speak again, and I cut in quickly.

"Isabel, did you tell anyone else about this? Or record it in?"

"No," she replies, blinking a little at my sudden use of her given name. The start of a grin flickers as she pushes the package into my waiting hand. "The chap on scanner in the mornings is a bit sweet on me, so he didn't ask much. Well – not about this, anyway."

"Good." I try to keep my voice calm. "Keep it that way. And it would be... better if you didn't seem too familiar with Audit Office symbols, in future."

She looks crestfallen, and I feel a prang of disappointment at my own blunt words.

"Thank you, though," I add. "It's safer at the moment if you aren't linked closely to me. Or that office."

Thorne glances back up, a sudden gleam in her eyes.

"I'm not afraid, Doctor Vachan," she says firmly. I cannot keep a rueful flicker of a smile off my lips, which seems to puzzle her.

"I know. But I am."

It is strange to say it, strange to allow space for the admittance in my thoughts. I am quite sure that Thorne does not understand the full significance of my words, as she takes her leave and the door slides closed behind her. I sit down again, heavily, and suddenly feel old. Damped-down, somehow, compared to the bright presences that move around me. That spark of determination in Thorne, a frankly-misplaced bravery, which borders on defiance against a world that would break her so easily for half of it. Cesar's soft smile when he thinks I'm not looking, and even the Captain's steel-edged determination, despite whatever end it may serve.

When was the last time I felt any of those fires in my own blood? A cushioned, hidden thrill at Morrigan's less-guarded words in my presence, perhaps, but even then, it is not truly my own daring. My youthful sedition is packaged and packed away with everything else I cannot be. What do I manage now? Small, petty irritations set for those that abhor my presence for their own reasons, or from principle alone. Hiding a few of the disfavoured in the shell of CYFAC's walls, where the ghosts of my own failures crowd thickly in my wake.

Perhaps that is enough. Perhaps the lives I might continue can compensate for those I have shortened; for my craven complicity in this City's undertakings, so wrapped in the shelters of excuse and obligation I can blind myself, as truly as the shine of my eyes might suggest to those who look at me.

Everything is a tool, and I am hers.

My splayed fingers drum against the desk, heat prickling across my cheeks, and I can feel the catch in my breath. Looking down again, focusing through the sudden wash of frustration, I stare at the strange package that lies between my hands. Sent a few days ago, Thorne had said. A few days ago in a completely different world, before the brilliant spark of my friend was replaced by some slumped, bloody caricature modelled in torn meat that I cannot even mourn – because every time my thoughts turn that way, there is nothing there except black fury and a helpless, dammedly impotent void where my soul should be.

What have you sent me, Joce? And did you die for it?

The packaging tears easily under my augmented grip, layers of wrapping that I peel aside in what seems an oddly visceral fashion to expose its contents, and at first I am utterly confused by what is revealed. Opened out, the pack contains three things: one data-drive, an ancient, case-stripped model mummified in electrical tape; and two finger-length matte-blue tubes, with vacuum-plastic seals plastered into place at one end. Both are labelled – "RSI01" and "RSI02" – and the drive does not even have that.

The scheduling roster is forgotten quickly as I lock the door and set my console into the hidden mode where it keeps no record of its use. Having that installed is a severe violation of remit by itself, but I have always considered that in any situation when this is discovered, a mere privacy program will be the least of my charges. It takes a moment or two for the drive to load, and –

Renosynthetic Integration.

Prototype.

I do not look up for some time as I scan through the files, instructions and schematics, with my heart in my throat. She had completed it. The idea we'd had, taken from idle musing to investigation plans, to... this. These two vials, sitting on my desk amidst the mess of torn packaging. A new kind of biosynthetic augment; not merely adding on to an existing system, but creating its own within the body itself. A massive, systemic increase in ability to meet environmental challenges, from poison or radiation, or any of Mother's toxic heritage.

If we can't change the world, we may change ourselves to meet it.

I read. I read, and I marvel, and it is only when the screen blurs too much to continue that I realise there are tears on my cheeks; that my breath is cracking into sobs, and I press my hands over my eyes to feel the throb of my own pulse screaming into the darkness there.

This is the second time, recently, that I have felt far too bloody human.

Joce should have taken this onward. She should have the ridiculous reward plaques, the Outstanding Advancement ceremonies with all their uncomprehending pomp, and the news broadcasts utterly failing to explain how huge this was. My own damned legacy is capitulation and oversight and death – but this?

This is new, and it is beautiful.

And untested.

That thought is sudden, and heavy, and I stare at the final readout on the screen, even as my fingers slide across the vials. The notes are less detailed here, towards the end of it, but I recognise the setup. An augment must be trialled out and successfully established in a human body before it can be officially recognised. This is one of the stages where I was to have helped the most, where we had pencilled in my own arrangements, because CYFAC understandably has considerably better facilities and equipment than RoCo when it comes to the monitoring of untested integrations.

There is one last file. It is very small, nothing but text, and when I read it my heart breaks a little further.

Asha,

Getting a bit tense around here. I've had to let go three staff this week because they'd started getting factional again – honestly, didn't this bullshit used to die down after a great political tantrum? F_S nearly clobbered the last one, poor love. I think I'm a bit old for Maidens in Armour coming to defend my honour, though I'll admit it's flattering!

But... just to be on the safe side, sending you this. Was hoping to unveil to you properly (as it were) next week, but needs must. Our mutual friend's chomping at the bit, so let's see if we can wow her this time?

Have a think on your end and I'll speak to you soon, darling.

-Jocelyn

I stare at that message for a long time, and the prototype vials are so smooth beneath my fingertips.

-

Militia Hub Three was a tall, blunt-faced building, sat like a stern watchtower in the centre of the District, an imposing piece of skyline-punctuation that was visible from most wide streets. S_R had long committed maps of the City to memory – the stamped-regular roads and highways of intentional planning, and the capillary trails of alleyways between those – and he knew that from above, the four Hubs sat perfectly in line with each other. In the centre of that square was the dramatic bulk of the Audit Office, singular in the angular theatre of its construction and the invisible lines of information like a web spun tight around Mother's heart.

The Hubs were less initially ominous, without all that vicious pomp and ceremony that the Office was designed for, but they did radiate an aura of brutal practicality. Iron bars crossed the windows, heavy riveted doors stood ever-so-slightly closed, displaying the metal teeth and blast-proofing that wasn't even slightly concealed. All in all, each hulking building looked designed to resist a pretty fucking committed siege, and there had been a time when S_R had found that comforting.

He wasn't quite as sure of that now.

Still, the accusatory bulk of Hub Three was softened by familiarity, and so he strode into the building with a commanding ease in his step. Rank badge prominent on his chest, batons strapped to his thighs, helmet under his arm, with the yellow-white slash in his hair exposed, bright like an exclamation. He could be shadow when he needed, but here, he wanted to be seen.

Captain S_R; 224-846-3. His name and identifier code, old-etched in stark black into the back of his neck, and for a moment he felt the weight of his Furtherance marks, similarly tattooed into the skin of his right arm. Block S, Bed R. Ward designations, assigned the moment you entered the PRIFAC system – in whatever way that was They told you what you were, and who you would become under Mother's ever-watchful gaze. Benevolent and brutal in equal measure, because you were Her Children; Wards of the State and raised for nothing less than perfection, to fulfil the potential that She had seen in you.

But there was a hell of a lot that She missed.

Inside the Hub, some of the grim display of the place fell away, under the mundane press of the day-to-day. Office doors sat open, spilling the sounds of conversation and briefings out into the corridors, and S_R passed by groups of Militiamen in various states of uniformed completeness, chatting or planning. Some of them jumped to attention when he passed – the younger faces, fresh from the PRI-FACs or Civ schooling, and nervous with it – some simply nodded their attention, and the older faces were genuine or disdainful, but direct about it. S_R ignored them all, visibly, although made careful note of any particularly darkly-thoughtful edges to the stares.

It always paid to have some idea of where the next challenge would come from, or the next punch you needed to throw.

He didn't make much effort to keep the irritation out of his stance, even as he reached the third floor, stepping into the cluster of open rooms and office space that made up his own Division. There was a faint clatter of shifting chairs as the few figures already present this early set themselves to attention, and S_R aimed a particularly pointed glower at the new Civ – Archer, or whatever the hell stupid name she had going on – who leapt to her feet, colouring instantly as his gaze swept across her.

"Morning, Captain!" she barked, ripping off a textbook salute, and stared with rapt nerves at a point in the air a few inches behind S_R's left ear. She was so new to the Division that she was still positioned on the temporary desks just to one side of the hallway, which meant he was getting nervous keenness practically beamed into the side of his head. It wasn't what he needed, right now.

He gave it a couple of heartbeats, just long enough for some of the colour to drain into a muted pallor across her cheeks, then turned to face her, and leaned forward. She was, irritatingly, a few inches taller than him, but it wasn't hard to look down at people who stood over you, when you knew the trick to it.

"I'm not in the mood for anyone crawling up my boots this early," he growled, a few inches away from her bent-over nose. "If anything's on fucking fire, I'll hear it. Otherwise? Sit. Your ass. Down."

There was the faintest of snorts from somewhere else in the room, although every other expression was perfectly blank when he shot a searching glance after the sound. Archer's throat tightened, an awkward attempt to swallow a nervous breath, and she managed a slight squeak.

"Yessir – sorrysir –"

S_R swivelled, dismissing, and stomped across the open space to the only room with an actual door, opening and shutting it behind him with force enough to border on a slam. Then he paused, counting under his breath, until the faint murmur of conversation started up again outside. He couldn't hear exactly what was being said, but experience would place a reasonable bet on 'prickly bastard' being at least part of it.

Good.

He took a long breath and let it out slowly, flexing his gloved fingers a few times to settle himself. No one was going to come barging in here, not after that little display, so he had a bit of time to himself.

The office wasn't particularly large compared some of the communal spaces, but it was private. One side of the room was taken up entirely with the desk; its files and paperwork arranged in a very precise state of disarray across the surface, and S_R could tell at a glance that either no one had tried to rifle through his documents, or they were very good at realigning apparent randomness. Not that he was stupid enough to keep anything really sensitive in his office.

S_R slung himself into the ergonomic embrace of his chair, which was another privilege of rank, along with the office, that he knew some of his more Wardly colleagues sneered at. Well, they could make snide comments about 'extravagant trappings' to their little hearts' desires, all fucking well enjoy their impending sciatica.

He set the grey, slanted shape of the desk's built-in console to boot up, and extracted a folder from the masking mess as he waited for almost-proverbial gears to grind awake. There was plenty of enough actual Militia work to be getting on with, and Chain-knew the tensions in the streets were running high right now, but he had more than one life to run and recent events had forced him to overlap them more than he liked. The CYFAC assault, and now this RoCO rubbish. Both were sufficiently outside his Divisional remit that he'd had to pull a few favours to keep the lead, but while his District Commander might have been an outdated tangle of Civvy jowls poured into a uniform, the man was sufficiently impressed by S_R's own apparent keenness to allow the irregularity.

If only the whole fucking wasn't taking so long. S_R glared down at the well-read folder, flipping it open at a random section, and scanned down the page as if he expected something new would jump out at him. Roth's murder was... aggravating. She had no links to the Castells that he had been able to identify, other than a passing familiarity with Vachan's hulking shadow, and there were plenty of people in this City who had a much more intimate knowledge of Cesar Castell than she did – the vast majority of whom had entirely failed to be murdered.

...yes, well.

As for Roth herself, S_R hadn't had much opinion on the Professor when she was still breathing. He'd heard the rumours of her proclivities, of course, because no one gossiped quite like Militiamen when they were off duty, but it wasn't like another Wardfucker was anything new for Citizens. Stewart's fingerprints were on her shoulder, for whatever reason, but S_R had had little contact with the woman for the most part. Not beyond her lists of things she would have him 'acquire', most of which had gone through Vachan anyway. He just... hadn't expected to be staring at scene photographs of her mutilated corpse, anytime soon. Bluntly? She didn't really seem interesting enough for anyone with a reasonable agenda to bother murdering.

S_R peered down at the opened folder, blinked as he eased it back a bit, then surrendered to necessity and dug a slim metal case out of his uniform jacket. The glasses within were new enough to feel strange against his face as he slid them into place, and he took a moment consider his reflection in the narrow office window.

Not bad. A bit more clerical than his usual mental image of himself, perhaps, but he could work with that. Plus, the reduction in eyeball-spearing headaches was worth sacrifice to vanity.

Anyway.

There were plenty of opinions already about Professor Roth's death, and about her killer. He flipped pages until he came to the copied Record of F_S (467-223-8). She had been an unremarkable Ward, according to everything in her file. Administrative Furtherances, two ranks; five different incidents of Disruptive Conduct on file (Behavioural: Improper). FAC reassignment to RoCo three years ago, no charges since.

Screwing your Facilitator would do that. S_R pushed down on the curl of distaste that pulled at his lips, and moved on again, pausing at a short section just beyond that one. Record of Correctional Behaviour Therapy. Two instances, both recorded Successful: Complete; no complications. A faint shiver ran down his neck, as if flowing out from his tattoos and across his shoulders.

'Disruptive conduct; persistent. Unrepentant. Your Functionary has recommended standard behavioural modification.'

Pressure, tight at his wrists, pressing his bared hands down against the gleaming metal beneath. Immobile, pinned tight around his chest even as the chill air seemed to yawn open across his stripped back. A dull rubber strip between his teeth, gagging, locked under his jaw and rough with the bitten-in agonies of previous use.

'You have a bright future in front of you, cadet S_R; potential to be a strong link in our great Chain. But even the finest metal can need reworking, from time to time."

The sharp press of fingertips into the thin skin above his eyes, dragging them open, the figure in vision itself indistinct in the harsh light of the room. There was panic, somewhere, but a strange chemical sensation was crawling through his blood and he couldn't even –

'Begin.'

"Captain?"

S_R jerked back to reality violently, slamming Roth's file closed, and managed to turn his waking jolt into an angry rise, ramming his hands down hard onto the desk surface to hide the shake of old memory that ran through them.

"What the hell do you –?" he snarled, trying to ignore the faint wash of heat across his cheeks. The intruder was Archer again, peering around the edge of the doorframe with the greyish expression of someone who had drawn a none-too proverbial short straw. To her credit, she didn't recoil very far under his glare.

"Morning Purity Hour's on," she said quickly. "You might want to hear this one."

She ducked out again, and S_R felt his teeth grind together as he shoved the folder back into its place in the stack and stood up. Purity Hour. Oh, fucking fantastic. That was exactly what he wanted to hear right now: the Office of Growth and Renewal's twice-daily, hour-long wireless propaganda slurry. He'd been thoroughly sick of the Mother-suckling bullshit they spouted before he had found himself putting a bullet through his former-sergeant's skull – and B_I had been a slack-jawed devotee of that damn programme.

He folded his glasses again and headed back into the main office, following the slightly-tinny sounds of the radio that sat atop a cabinet in one corner. There had previously been a loudspeaker bolted into the wall, which would start droning out all that garbage on its cue, but it had recently seemed to be the victim of repeated, very specific vandalism.

He was looking into it. Of course.

The portable wireless was a compromise, between S_R's own preference of never hearing those smug tones and their bleached-down advocacy of Purity and Clean Thoughts ever again, and keeping his more thusly-inclined officers actually in the Division during the broadcasts. They were standing around it now – Wards, mostly, and generally on the younger end of the scale – leaning in with careful attention as the clipped introduction music began. S_R took up a silent position, arms folded, at the back of the group. The Civilians, he noted, were mostly still at their desks, paying attention to anything except the broadcast as the warbling old song finished on its usual platitude.

' – and may Mother, our Mother, guide us again; for we are brothers and sisters under the Chain –'

The sound switched, quite suddenly, and S_R noted the faint change in stance of the surrounding group. They were relaxing, almost. In a complicated world, in a City so much larger than the regimented, regulated reality of the PRIFACs, and uncomfortably full of all sorts of things that didn't fit easily into the black-and-white ideals they'd been given as iron-truth since the earliest days – Purity Hour was an uncomplicated comfort. Reminding you, with each oiled word that dripped from the presenter's coal-blacked lips, of how to approach these confusing things. How to make Clean Choices. How to be a Loyal and Productive Child of Mother.

To be a Good Ward.

He hated it. The winsome voice, even in this tinny crackling version, seemed to wind out unpleasantly beneath his thoughts, setting his teeth on edge and his hackles up, as it broke the world down into easily-swallowable pieces of bullshit. And the broadcasts were so fucking hard to ignore, if you could actually hear them. Something in the sound, in the way the presenter spoke, drilled into the attention and S_R felt his arms tightening further, his fingers pressing into their opposite biceps hard enough to hurt.

Standing at attention, swallowing back both the tears that threatened and the pain that birthed them, from long lines of hot agony that throbbed across the back of his hands. He couldn't move, mustn't move, as the Warder leaned down over him. Blacked-out eyes, sickly-sweet breath pouring out either side of the mask they wore, and he tried not to blink, in case that was defiance too.

'Mother hurts when we hurt; Bed R. When we are disobedient, to our sweet Mother who has given us so much. Would you hurt Her further?'

His eyes were burning as he shook his head. He knew in his heart that it was a lie, and a lie is a Sin the eyes of Mother.

But it is their fault he is learning how to lie...

They were talking about Roth. S_R's attention snapped back to the now – again, and he made a grudging mental note that he should try and get more sleep this week, since staring off into space wasn't getting anything useful done – and he leaned forward, eyes narrowing as he listened more closely.

"...debauchery that can only have one end, my sweet siblings. Ignominious disposal in the unclean earth; buried in the ground like animal bones, not even fit for Processing. It is a purification, a cleansing of our State of these debased relics of a weaker time, and we shall rejoice in it. Keep silence in your thoughts, for our violated Sister, doing Mother's work even in such darkened life..."

Not exactly case-breaking stuff. F_S had scrubbed and bleached her hands beyond raw, and cut her Citizen lover's throat before taking her own life. There were only so many ways you could read that story if you tried. Quarrel? Infidelity? Overwhelmed by carnal guilt – which these sort of bloody broadcasts wouldn't help with? It certainly wasn't the first case of Snap that S_R had seen, and wasn't even the most visceral.

And if it hadn't been for the proximity to the CYFAC attack, and his own understanding of the hidden link of Stewart's damn Collection between the two targets, he might even have believed it. He glared at the radio, as the sick-sweet tones of Purity moved the target of their disapproval to more abstract concepts, and found the image of F_S rising again in his mind. The scars on her hands, and her shoulders. The ones he found so chillingly familiar.

He had known Corrected Wards to become loyalist – and there was rarely anything so full of piss and vitriol as a born-again – but F_S's marks looked as old as his own, and it had been years since the last time he'd been young or stupid enough to make his misbehaviours obvious. Plus, the impression he got from RoCO in general was that it was even more lax than CYFAC in its approach to enforcing Approved behaviour.

There was something else going on; because when it really came down to the wire? There was a hell of a lot less different between F_S, and S_R himself than he was exactly thrilled about, and he wasn't about to just up and...

...and...

Well. Certainly not off himself with a broken chandelier, that was for damn sure.

-

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