[chapter:Cartridge 01: Sine Requie]

  [i:No rest for the wicked or for the saint either]

  That room was strange. There were candles all over the place, the windows were opening and closing as she watched them and the light itself seemed to bend between blue and red accents. But that wasn’t what was important. What was important was the beautiful fox specimen that was brushing his body on hers, ravaging her deepest parts with an unquenchable passion. Rondeau couldn’t help but squeal, let her breath go, let her voice reach louder and louder heights. The taste of his sweat. The taste of his lips. The tail that wagged every time he pushed, every time he pulled. Rondeau’s fingers clenched the bed sheets, as pleasure surged all inside her, as Apple’s tongue explored her skin, making her jolt at every touch. Close. So close. On the edge of reaching the climax. She opened her eyes, stared at him, at those marvelously sculpted abs, at those fit pecs hovering on her, at his fragrant auburn hair, at his shining red irises.

  Red.

  Irises?

  No, Apple’s irises were amber. Not red.

  But they were.

  Red. Shining. Glowing.

  And and

  She shrieked. Metal. Tendrils. Sprouted from his back, ripped his flesh apart, shone in the light of the candles. She tried to move, she tried to do something, but her muscles wouldn’t follow, her orders wouldn’t come through. She stared at him, at his face contorting in pain, at his grimace. At the claw emerging from his throat, at the blood pouring out of it. At the LED patterns that replaced his eyes. Before the harpoon sank in her chest, piercing her heart from side to side.

  A desperate scream shook the air.

  And Rondeau woke up.

  Lying on a cot in a night train.

  Sweating profusely.

  Her breath was ragged, her heart was still racing. Her cheeks were wet. Calm down, calm down. A nightmare. Just a bloody nightmare. She turned around with her eyes wide open. Left. Right. She had lost all sense of direction. What was up? What was down? Her senses were still confused, her mind still scarred. Until she finally saw him. Apple. Also lying on his cot. Squinting his eyes at her while covering his ears. Wearing nothing and proudly showing no shame in it.

  “…bad dream, I take it? Sounded like that, at least.”

  Rondeau let herself fall on her sheets, inspected her plain t-shirt and pajama pants. No blood. No wounds. No scratches. No bites. No hickeys. All her clothes were still there. It was just that, a nightmare. Nothing more. Nothing more than that. She looked up to the carriage’s ceiling, still savoring those conflicting feelings, the visceral fears that hid inside her. A long sigh escaped her lips.

  “…yeah. Quite bad. It started wonderfully and ended… real messed up.”

  “Well, that’s just a standard Rondeau day.”

  She raised her finger, almost as if she wanted to object, before lowering it immediately after. That hit a little too close home. Her handcuff clinked, its broken chain oscillated like a pendulum. She caressed the chrome, stopped the motion with her other hand. That was one of the cuffs that chained her to that bed in Valarajo, the same she tried to get rid off for so long. In the end, she found a locksmith worth their salt, but decided to keep one of them as a lucky charm. She could open and close it at will, wearing it or taking it off when she wanted to. Not that she had ever removed it, since then. Her right wrist had been embraced by that cold metal for the past weeks and got accustomed to it. Her left wrist, though, had been freed. That cuff had now a new owner—a young boy that was going to become a new cog in the Order’s meat grinder.

  “Just you watch, Miss Executioner! I’ll show you what I’m made of!”

  A souvenir to keep him motivated, to remind him of their encounter. He wore it immediately, on its left wrist, closing it as soon as he got it. Her right handcuff, his left one. That simple interaction, that useless gift made her feel like she created a connection with that kid from Genuya. That little squirt sure talked big for his age, but was still a kid. A little encouragement couldn’t harm. She inhaled, exhaled. That memory calmed her down, made the gruesome pictures of a fox turning jugger leave her mind for a while. Now, though, the real deal was still looking at her with his piercing gaze, dick out in the open and everything. She gulped down a lump of saliva, found it impossible to avert her eyes from that bonanza.

  “Let me guess. You want me to put my pants on?”

  “T—that would help, yes?”

  He groaned, lay back on his cot, wrapped his tail around his hips—somehow hiding the source of contention.

  “Too bad, I have no intention of doing that. This is the best I can do for you.”

  She felt the sudden impulse of petting his fur and move that tail out of the way again, only for her mind to slap her instinct. Twice. Thrice. Until those thoughts left it. Maybe. Partly. Enough, at least. But not completely. Right. It was to be expected. Abstinence was, indeed, her greater enemy when her fox was around. Three weeks without a robrothel made her will weaker, bottom-of-the-barrel weak. But asking Apple to do her? No, that was absolutely off the menu. No way in hades. So, she left her cot instead, wore her slippers, walked to the door of her compartment.

  “I… think I’ll get something at the board restaurant. You fancy some snacks?”

  Apple smirked, looked at her with the sassiest expression he could muster, licked his lips for a good measure.

  “I’d eat your cherry right now, for a change.”

  Rondeau gulped down a lump of saliva. The allure of Apple’s body, the fragrance of his scent. Maybe, maybe she could have… just once, she could have… She leaned forward over him, mere centimeters away from his face, from his smug grin, looking at his amber eyes as her cheeks started to turn red. Suddenly, the nightmare came back. The red irises. The metal ripping through the flesh. For an instant. For just an instant. Images from the past, coming back to torment her. A dead past, long buried behind. She jolted, blushed violently, screamed back at Apple.

  “N-no! Over my cold dead body!”

  “Come on, I’m not a necrophiliac, Rondeau. I have standards.”

  He suddenly burst into laughter, shook his head too, waved his hand at her

  “…sorry, I was teasing you. Your question right now? It was too perfect—I just… couldn’t resist.”

  Rondeau yelped, covered her face, turned away from him, avoided every sort of eye contact. He lowered his ears, his voice tone turned back to normal, with a sort of deeply apologetic tone.

  “My bad, I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable. Abstinence makes it hard for me too, yes? And… huh, about before… I just, you know, hate pants. They make my skin itchy and they annoy me so much I’d like to rip them off with my fangs, but I can’t walk in the nude or I’d be arrested for public indecency. Wearing clothes is a torture for us foxes, we just do it because we are forced to—I mean, ask Limette, if you don’t believe me. There’s a reason why she unbuckles her ‘dress’ whenever she can. So, at least when I sleep and when nobody’s around, I’d rather… not to. You should already know this, right? Haven’t we had the same discussion, like, a dozen times?”

  Rondeau lowered her gaze, didn’t say anything. A strong sense of deja-vu hit her. True, they talked about it. Several times, indeed. But he wasn’t the first who told her that. She heard almost the exact same words from…

  She gritted her teeth. Memories. Again. Her heart started to pound, her pupils to dilate, her…

  “…but, yeah, if you go to the board bistro, please bring back a toast and some orange juice. I’m not saying no to a midnight snack.”

  Apple’s voice stopped her train of thought from derailing. She calmed down, slowly, turned back to the present moment.

  “The usual ham and cheese with peanut butter?”

  “That’s fine.”

  “Got it, but don’t wait up, it might take a while.”

  “You’ll wake me up anyway by opening the door. You’re as delicate as a hand grenade, when it comes to moving around.”

  “Guilty as charged.”

  Rondeau closed the door behind her, left for the corridor with a deep breath, sealing the naked fox on the other side and cleaning up her mind from the last few minutes. She looked around, trying to find her bearing in the dimly lit corridor. The train was a little cramped, but overall still in a good shape. The small gaps between the tracks made it rumble every few seconds, in a regular soundscape background she had learned to filter. She glanced at the crescent in the sky through the dusty windows, at the stars above them. In other circumstances, she would have found that trip enjoyable. But protecting a bloody politician on his way to sign a treaty? That wasn’t her ideal of executioner duty, it was something more apt for those army lapdogs. She yawned a little, moved away from the window, started walking towards the head of the train. The restaurant car was not that far ahead, just a couple carriages after the first class cabins. Because, of course, there were luxury seats for the big shots. Comfortable beds instead of metal cots. Minibar and refrigerator with champagne. Rumors had it that there was also a fox included in the package, but that couldn’t be right. Only Order members had access to a personal fox and you couldn’t buy one anymore, no matter how rich you were. Still, theory and practice didn’t always mesh well together.

  Rondeau kept walking, stepping right in front of said first class compartments, as quiet as possible. One figure, though, stole her attention. Out of his cabin, in front of a window, stood a tall man with long, slick, flowing black hair, wearing a dark gray uniform and elaborate shoulder pads that held an equally elaborate cape. The lower part of his face was covered by a black veil that obscured everything from the nose below. Rondeau stared at him for a long second, trying to remember his name—in vain. He had to be on the passenger list, but she didn’t care enough to memorize all the guests. The marks on his sleeve identified him as third class field officer. High rank, higher than what was needed for such a charade. The man glanced back at her, with his glacial azure eyes. Their stares met for an instant, before his turned back to the panorama outside. Rondeau walked by without saying a word. Their interaction ended with the same silence that introduced it, dotted only by the rhythmic noise of the train moving on the tracks. She didn’t pay attention to him, he didn’t pay attention to her. The unwritten code of conduct between the Order and the army. Ignore and go forth. Still, something didn’t feel right. Those pauldrons, that cape, that uniform…

  A powerful yawn broke containment, causing her to stretch a little, shake her head.

  Yeah, right. Of course. A high ranking army official at the core of a jugger infestation. That was as stupid as it could get, maybe even more—the conspiracy stuff Tango would swim into without regret. No, yeah, her brain was definitely not awake enough for that. So, she left him behind, walked even faster to the end of that carriage.

  Finally, an indication for the board restaurant peeked from the wall, price list included. She didn’t care to read it, it was not necessary. They could have served tar sandwiches and gasoline, for what she cared: everything would have been fair game, as long as she could keep Apple’s luscious body outside of her mind.

  And forget that gruesome nightmare that awakened even more gruesome memories.

  That was all she could do, for the moment.

  [chapter:Cartridge 02: Midnight Snack]

  [i:Chasing the past is a fruitless endeavor]

  The board bistro was, of course, manned by a very simple automaton. No way a train that cheap would have real human personnel at that time of the night. The good thing was that those bots were easy to hack. Making them believe they had been paid in full while not giving them a singe coin was way too simple. Rondeau would have done that with no regrets whatsoever. There was just a problem, though, and that problem sat at the only occupied table in the barren restaurant carriage.

  Wearing an executioner uniform, no less.

  Rondeau had thought about leaving her stomach empty and run back to her cabin, after catching a glimpse of the unexpected guest. Still, exchanging a couple of words was a common courtesy, one she couldn’t really avoid. So, she reluctantly waved her hand at the other person, getting a nod of their head as a response. ‘Their’, because she didn’t know whether Ragtime was a man, a woman or anything in between. Ragtime never ever clarified it and always wore clothes that didn’t allow for gauging their biological make up. Loose uniform, a foulard always in front of their mouth in public, a large dark blue hat topping their black eyes and equally black hair, falling on their shoulders in long dreadlocks. Ragtime’s complexion was of a darker brown than Rondeau’s, but not quite black. Nobody had seen them without their foulard, except for short moments while they were eating. Even then, no conclusive evidence was gathered. A couple of curious peepers even tried to follow them and see which bathroom they’d use, only for Ragtime to sneak into the restroom for disabled people, making that exercise moot. The fact that their fox was female, a refined specimen named Paprika, meant nothing at all: they could have been anything, ranging from a heterosexual man to a lesbian woman, with no way of getting it short of staring at them naked. Even then, it wouldn’t have been the smoking gun that would have settled the score. And Paprika, of course, wouldn’t tell. The fox was sitting with her mastress, sipping tea with an elegance Limette could only dream of. She was wearing the same open-sided standard female fox dress, with both buckles secured. An azure ribbon peeked from her slick auburn hair, which was arranged in an intricate braid that fell on the right side of her face, down to her breasts. Her right wrist carried several golden bracelets, her ring finger was adorned by gold and a small, shining emerald.

  Rondeau stared at the odd couple for a short while, before sitting at the counter, starting to browse the list in search of something light enough for both her stomach and her wallet.

  “I see we aren’t the only ones who can’t sleep. How’s it going, Rondeau?”

  Ragtime’s voice finally broke the silence, at the most inopportune of times. Rondeau kept reading the list, while answering in tune.

  “Bad dreams. Of the clicky-clacky chestbusting type.”

  Paprika sipped more of her tea, put down her cup on the small table, beamed at her with a soft chuckle.

  “Pray, haven’t you beseeched Apple for comfort? I am most sure he would not wait a second, before sharing his warmth with you, Mistress Rondeau. Or was he asleep, thus making it hard for you to inconvenience him? My, you should not tread so lightly with him, as we foxkins are made to serve and satisfy our partners.”

  “Paprika, not this again.”

  Paprika nodded at her mastress, beamed at them too.

  “I beg your pardon, Mastress Ragtime?”

  Ragtime caressed her shoulder, played with her braid, combing it with their gloved fingers. They didn’t have anything on their table, as if their presence there was just to keep company to their fox.

  “Leave Rondeau alone. What she does and doesn’t do with Apple isn’t our business. Last time I warn you.”

  Paprika groaned, lowered her ears, sipped more of her tea. Her face turned into a mask of disappointment, much like a paparazzo that was denied access to some juicy gossip she craved for. Ragtime shrugged, gazed back at Rondeau.

  “Sorry, it’s just that there are… quite some rumors going around. Some say that you and Apple, you know, never consumed your partnership and that you only mate at robrothels.”

  “Let me guess: it was Waltz who let the cat out of the bag, right?”

  “Rumors don’t have an origin. They just spawn from nothingness and propagate like cancer. Finding out who said what is an exercise in futility.”

  Ragtime interrupted themselves for an instant, looked around quickly, before moving their eyes back to Rondeau. Their voice became a whisper, one that Rondeau could still barely hear.

  “…yes, it was Waltz. One hundred percent. He was so shocked about it that he kept telling the same story for days, until everyone in Cadenza heard it—Dr. Pluto included.”

  “Figures.”

  “…just between us, I think he’s got a crush on your fox and would gladly be railed by him. I also think Apple made him realize he’s not as straight as he thought he was, and now he’s craving for a close private encounter with him.”

  “Who wouldn’t?”

  “…you, apparently.”

  Rondeau’s hand stopped on the list, froze for an instant. She gritted her teeth, almost crumpled the menu in her hands.

  “…I walked straight into that, dammit.”

  Ragtime rested their cheek on their hand, drawing circles on the table with the other one.

  “Speaking of ‘straight’, Rondeau… pardon my being indelicate, but have you by chance, you know, changed to ‘camp same’? When Peach was still around, you two were… huh, going at it like wild animals, to put it mildly. The walls of my room were… too thin to contain your, huh, enthusiasm. So, you and Apple not… finding a way, even after one year together, doesn’t… doesn’t feel like the Rondeau I used to know. Have you… huh, had the same lesbian awakening as Bachata? Because, maybe, you could ask the Order for another fox, in that case! There’s plenty of female ones that…”

  “Weren’t you grilling your fox for asking me the same, Rags? Ain’t it a little bit hypocritical?”

  Ragtime tipped their hat, looked down.

  “Yeah. Sorry, you’re right. Not my business.”

  “Damn correct.”

  Rondeau snapped her fingers, getting the attention of the robot at the counter.

  “One jug of beer, a small bottle of orange juice and two toasts: a ham and cheese with peanut butter to take away and one with tomatoes and mozzarella to eat here. Put all on my tab.”

  The robot turned around, a green light shone on its head.

  “>Executioner Rondeau of Cadenza recognized. Processing payment. Payment processed. Your order will be ready in three minutes.”

  That was a monotone voice, without any warmth or emotion. Yet, it was still reassuring. Always the same, without surprises. Unchanging. A fixed point in space and time. She crossed her arms on the counter, rested her head on them. Great, exactly what she needed. Thinking about Peach again. She closed her eyes, as her lips trembled, as a powerful sadness took hold of her. She felt her entire being shaken, tears ready to burst from her eyes, sobs ready to escape her mouth. But she couldn’t allow them to, not in front of other people. Not in front of anyone. Except Apple. Yes, Apple wouldn’t judge her for it. He would just hug her, let her cry, let her tears run till the very end, before hugging her tighter. His scent, his voice, the softness of his tail, the gentle blush on his cheeks, his hand moving through her hair… she could feel all of it, in that moment of solitude, craving it, needing it. But not when Ragtime was around. Not when anyone else could see her. Especially not Waltz.

  “Oh, huh, Rondeau? One more thing…”

  Ragtime’s voice. Again. Rondeau counted up to ten, considering whether to throw something at them, then slowly calming down, calming down.

  “If it’s about my sex life…”

  “Nah, I’m dumb but not that dumb. It’s about the jugger in Valarajo. You know, the one I was sent to track down with Bachata last month, after it survived your… huh, percussive maintenance.”

  “The one from the brothel?”

  “Yeah, that. Well, it went poof. We didn’t find it, as much as we tried. I went down the sewers three times without luck. It simply disappeared, and—huh—stole the carcass of the six-hander that entertained you. We couldn’t find that either.“

  Rondeau groaned. That last detail was, indeed, terrible news. She was looking forward to Magic Six taking her for a ride again. Well, that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon, then.

  ”That guy, Ricardo, was fu-mi-ga-ting! Heck, he was more worried about the six-hander than about the jugger… and he even asked us why we didn’t bring Apple with us! You should have seen him, wearing more perfume than a prostitute, dressed in a fancy suit, having his hair styled, and coming to meet us with a huuuge bouquet of flowers. Your fox stole his heart. That guy was so depressed when he found out he wasn’t with us that it was almost funny. But, yeah, your jugger has disappeared and is currently off the grid.”

  “So?”

  “So, command and control classified it as ‘missing’ and sent a couple of recruits to keep an eye on the place. We didn’t record any spread or infection. If it’s still alive, it must be an adult. I guess we’ll see.”

  A loud jingle broke the conversation.

  “>Beer and orange juice. Toast with tomatoes and mozzarella. Toast with ham, cheese and peanut butter. Have a nice meal, Executioner Rondeau of Cadenza!”

  Rondeau grabbed the sandwiches, raised her hand in a useless sign of gratitude.

  “I guess I’ll drink over it.”

  She brought the glass to her lips, started chugging down the alcohol.

  Too many problems, too many questions. Still, she could afford savoring a moment of quiet, before the nightmares came back to ravage her existence.

  [chapter:Interlude: My mortal coil]

  [i:The you inside is aching to show off]

  Mia whistled. It was a nice feeling, to be able to whistle. Her lips were closing and opening perfectly, her eyes could admire the world around. She caressed her hair, white because she couldn’t settle on a color. She kept them neck-length, for no reason except aesthetic. Aesthetic. Right. That had no function or goal, she just… liked it. Though, for colors, it was harder. She didn’t know exactly what she wanted, so she decided not choose yet. Her body had grown up well, it almost looked like that of a human. Almost. There were metal plates peeking all around her skin (symmetric and in a way that looked pleasant to her eye). Her cheeks, the lower parts of her chest under her breasts, her hips… all of them were wrapped in some measure by shining metallic bands. Her neck too, sporting several concentric rings that got wider as they met her collar bones. If anything, she loved how they looked on her and spent quite some time admiring her figure in reflections and mirrors. That was her body. Not the black broken mess of metal and flesh that dragged itself out of that building after she was born. Her own body. The shell she had built for herself, the shell she designed to encase her core. She felt a spark of joy at the realization. An adult. She was an adult now and she savored every second of it. She glanced at her hands, closing and opening rhythmically under her gaze, every finger separately. Her arms were different from the rest of her body. Both of them looked mechanical, as if she ripped them off from a robot. Which wasn’t necessarily a lie, since they came from the six-hander she merged with. It was a necessity of sorts—those arms worked too well to be discarded and it was only thanks to the memory banks of the six-hander if she managed to build such a marvelous, anatomically accurate reproduction of a human body.

  She whistled a little more, giggled too, while tapping her feet on the dirt, stepping on and off the thin layer of asphalt that led to the gas station. That six-hander had such extensive databases on what to touch and how to elicit reactions from a human body. It was crazy to her that humans had so many nerves and terminations in their nether regions and breasts. She replicated them to the best of her abilities, following the blueprints as close as she managed to. So, now she was ready to the last step.

  Interacting with real humans.

  Not just play pretend.

  Talk with the real deal.

  Thirty-four light-dark cycles had passed since her birth.

  Thirty-four light-dark cycles of loneliness.

  The damage to her case had severed her connection with her own kind, isolating her from their network. So, she had to survive alone, eating rats, lizards, small dogs and even cats. A cow too, even though cows were too big and took too much time to consume. But not humans. She would never consume a human.

  Humans were scary.

  Dangerous.

  Lethal.

  Territorial.

  Kill one and all the others hunt you.

  Scary.

  Apex predators, humans.

  She shivered, her lips trembled.

  Humans would kill her, if they realized she wasn’t human. Nevertheless, the thrill, the excitement of learning more about them, more than what the six-hander could teach her, was real. She had learned a couple of things, while watching humans in the shadows, following them with her gaze without being seen. The first was that for no reason she had to show her extra four arms, tucked inside her back. The second was that she needed to cover her naughty bits, whatever that meant. So, she ‘borrowed’ a ragged poncho from a parked car and started wearing it, making sure it covered the regions of interest marked in the six-hander’s database, to a level she deemed at least satisfactory. The third thing she learned was never to say the word juggernaut or jugger or to identify as one. That’s how humans called her kind. Using that word to identify herself as one was a risk that was not worth taking.

  She shivered again.

  The gun. The shots hurt. Being blasted to bits hurt.

  All because of a misunderstanding. One she wanted to clarify.

  The woman with spiky hair that her former shell massaged, that her six-hander explored.

  She wanted to meet her again. If anything, just to interact with her. Mia felt a sort of magnetic attraction, one she could not explain. She longed to see her again. They had unfinished business and her arms, her hands, all of her fingers ached to get that sorted out.

  So, carefully, she decided to make the first step. There were two humans at that gas station, both dressed in blue (the color of the sky. It was amazing how human eyes could see colors and not just heat profiles). They didn’t carry weapons. No guns. No blades. She had run a scan on them, all they had was their fists. The chances of being damaged by them were absolutely negligible. That gave her some peace of mind. So, she walked forward, waving her hand at them, trying to put together words as she had learned from watching them speak.

  “Hiii! Hiiii!”

  The sound of her voice surprised her. It was so different from the grinding of gears, the beeps and the clacking noise her pupa produced. That was the first time she shouted like that, the first time she let her voice resonate that way. She scanned the two humans again, to gauge their reactions. They had just turned to face her. Both male specimens, in their early twenties on a human age scale. She turned to her heat vision, saw their temperature increase in real time. They looked at each other with something like puzzlement, before staring back at her.

  Mia stopped, beamed at them, waved her hand faster. Internally, she was screaming. She was hoping they wouldn’t harm her, forcing herself not to run away preemptively. She had to stay there, at least exchange a few words, otherwise it would have been a failure. She prepared her four extra arms, in case things went south. Prepared to defend herself to the very end, if worse came to worst. Still, their reaction was mild.

  “…hi?”

  “How… huh, can we help you…?”

  They were talking to each other, now, exchanging glances and stares. Mia enhanced her hearing, increased the sensitivity of her ears, trying to catch every single word they uttered.

  “What’s her deal? She’s… huh, half naked?”

  “Who cares about her clothes, have you seen her arms? And that… Yuvia take me, are those metal plates?”

  “Another of those weird fashion trends?”

  “Well, if it causes an uptick of half naked chicks…”

  “Oh, shut up!”

  Mia nodded, almost beamed in excitement. They found her unsettling, but not scary. They didn’t think she wasn’t one of them. That was already good. They didn’t show hostility. She giggled, almost as an involuntary reflex. That felt like a step in the right direction. So, she played her next move, hopping towards the two humans.

  “Hi! Where brothel? Look for brothel!”

  Brothel was a word etched in the six-hander’s memory. It was the place she was born into, the place where everything started. It felt like a good way to test her mettle. The two humans crossed gazes one more time, before turning towards her again, almost in unison.

  “…a brothel?”

  She browsed her library of gestures, settled for a nod.

  “Mia looks for it! But no find road!”

  The two men looked at her, looked back at each other, looked back at her. The one on the right pointed his finger at the building behind him. It was kind of small, still wrapped in scaffolding, tape, and transparent plastic sheets.

  “…there. There’s the brothel. Do you, huh, work there?”

  Mia shook her head horizontally, using another gesture taken out of her database.

  “No work, want meet someone! Someone special!”

  Again, the two of them couldn’t make heads or tails of that situation, just blink very slowly as that strange girl in front of them smiled with all of herself, radiating her inner light on them. The man on the left broke that embarrassing silence, stuttering a little to find the right words.

  “Then, huh, have fun. You, huh, really shouldn’t go around dressed like that, though”

  “Yeah. It’s… dangerous. If we weren’t here to look for a jugger, this place wouldn’t be safe.”

  “So, huh, please behave, okay?”

  Mia nodded again, pranced close to them, looked at them up close. Those two humans were so different from each other and yet so similar. Still, they didn’t catch her. They didn’t realize she wasn’t one of them. So, strengthening her resolve, she waved her hand and ran away, hopping like an excited bunny in the direction of the robrothel.

  She could barely wait to have more interactions with other human beings.

  [chapter:Cartridge 03: Railistic Expectations]

  [i:Silver tongue, good vibes, bad luck]

  Hector Verhoven hated trains. Despite that, he was riding a luxury carriage on the Midnight Express 150, from Cadenza to Valletta, through the South Mediterranean Desert. It would have been easier if the great bridge had been built, but the government dismissed it as unnecessary infrastructure. He knew all about it, since he was part of the very same government. And, after all, the vote that broke the tie was his (or so he liked to think). Well, it was the right thing to do—cutting that massive waste of public money and resources made everyone a favor. Now, though, that train trip made him question his decision, as the train stumbled through the uneven ground, bumping between tracks to his destination. No bridge meant a rockier ride, more unpredictable, endless. Ten to twelve hours, in ideal conditions. Flying was a no go too, of course. He could have flown, but the cargo couldn’t follow him in the belly of whatever jetliner they used—too dangerous. And, of course, as a member of the government, he didn’t want to be held responsible in case said cargo was stolen while he was enjoying his time inside a flying five star cabin. First, because it would have painted him as an egotistical money-waster in the eyes of the constituents. Secondly, because his public image had already been damaged enough even without that and election season was rapidly approaching. So, there he was, fighting a painful headache on the Midnight Express 150, bringing sensitive wares and documents to a diplomatic meeting under the protection of two hundred army soldiers and two Order executioners. The whole train had been reserved for them, with no civilian passengers around. That was necessary and good, but didn’t reduce the time needed for the trip. Nor the annoying necessity of interacting with the on board official, that preposterous show-off of Immanuel Galland. Verhoven got it, uniforms and all, official duty and all, but pauldrons and cape? Seriously? That kind of attire was restricted to ceremonial parades, not to business trips. Yet, ‘half-face’ Galland didn’t care and wore it anyway.

  Even in front of him, in that precise moment.

  Verhoven adjusted his tie, gulped down a lump of saliva. Dead of night, everyone should have been sleeping—them included. The best time to discuss business.

  “So, the cargo is secured, right? I don’t want to see it go off before we reach our destination.”

  The man called Galland stared at him, playing with the black veil covering the lower half of his visage.

  “We’ve done what we could.”

  His voice was deep, raspy, artificial. Verhoven couldn’t help but feel uneasy, in the presence of his guest. Nobody knew how Galland lost his jaw, but rumors abounded. Some said he never had it in the first place. Someone else told stories of brutal betrayals and covert military operations. Whatever the truth, Immanuel Galland never showed his mouth to anybody and had one mechanical hand, maybe a full arm. He was also barely thirty years old, making him one of the youngest officers in his position, despite his handicaps. Verhoven didn’t like the sound of his voice—or, rather, he didn’t like anything about him. Still, he had chosen him as his military referent for that mission and had to deal with him, want it or not.

  “I hope this also means that all of your men got the experimental jugger vaccine, before boarding the train. I explicitly requested that and I was assured it would be the case.”

  Galland closed his eyes, snapped his artificial fingers with a somewhat elegant motion.

  “I made sure of it, don’t worry: all of them took the shot last week and have been monitored for the past seven days. We don’t know whether that vaccine has any delayed side effects, but I’m confident it will work out all right… at least in the short term.”

  “Come on, there’s nothing to worry about, Galland! The small scale clinical trials have produced positive results, that’s enough for me. As long as we’re sure that our soldiers can’t be turned against us before the end of this, let’s call it, ‘diplomatic mission’, I don’t see a problem with it.”

  Even if they got a bad flu later or their cognitive processed declined after their active duty ended, it was still a win in Verhoven’s book. Soldiers were made to fight and protect their nation. What happened to them afterwards wasn’t so important, in the grand scheme of things. Galland, though, didn’t look amused. If anything, his glacial gaze was as sharp as a knife, staring deep into Verhoven’s soul, diving into an endless stretch of tar and mud, a pitch black expanse that corroded everything it touched.

  “So, have you taken the shot too, Verhoven?”

  Verhoven answered with an equally piercing gaze, trying to hide a disgusted grimace.

  “As if! I’m not a lab rat.”

  “Neither are my men.”

  Galland stood up, left the chair behind. He glanced at Verhoven one more time, before turning around, snapping his metallic fingers again.

  “I’ll get some shuteye. Send someone to wake me up when we cross the border.”

  “Wait a moment longer, please. I’m not finished.”

  “I don’t see what else we have to discuss.”

  “There was a report on my desk last week, about the events in Genuya. One executioner testified that a man in an unidentified army uniform was spotted in the middle of the commotion…”

  Galland stopped, blocked his fingers before his third snap took place. Verhoven continued, all while his face turned more and more into a cruel smile.

  “…coincidentally, the same executioner I requested for this mission.”

  “And?”

  “I don’t know, Galland. You should tell me.”

  “I’ve got nothing to tell.”

  “Of course. The army didn’t have any reasons to be there. There’s no chance in hades that any of you planned the tragic ‘accident’ that befell that insignificant town, I take it?”

  “Exactly.”

  Verhoven grinned.

  “Maybe, I should ask Executioner Rondeau about that. Maybe, we could do it together tomorrow morning, before our meeting with the local delegation. How does it sound, Galland? Aren’t you itching to learn what happened, right from the horse’s mouth?”

  Galland didn’t answer. He simply closed the cabin door behind him, slamming it as heavily as he could, without even humoring his host with parting words.

  **

  Apple turned around again in his cot, let his breath stabilize. His cheeks were red, his muscles relaxed. The unexpected departure of Rondeau gave him time to cool down a little, to let out some steam. He wrapped his tail around his lower body, all while his ears were low, twitching a little. His chest was going up and down in a steady rhythm. He was savoring the moment, the clarity that enveloped his now tamed mind. Rondeau’s body was etched inside it. There wasn’t a day when his animal instincts didn’t goad him, ask him how she’d taste. That was his nature, the nature of a creature made only to satisfy the cravings of frustrated executioners. Yet, Rondeau was unusual. She was scared of physical contact. Scared of letting herself go. Apple whimpered, let his tail stroke his body more. It was different, when Cha Cha Cha was there. It was different, when he was her fox. She would always find time for him, he would always find time for her. No abstinence, no unsaid words, just mutual passion taken to its absolute sublimation. He missed that time, but couldn’t fault his current mistress. Rondeau had been clear from the first day and he accepted her conditions. If anything, he could relieve his cravings whenever he wanted. She couldn’t. She had to obey laws and restrictions that limited what she was allowed to do. Because she was an executioner—a carrier of the jugger infection. Contrary to him, she had it rougher. While he could simply not care and carry on, like he just did. So, there he lay, in his cot, while his mind raced, his senses expanded.

  Rondeau could have been on her way back, bringing him a sandwich from the board bistro. Maybe now, maybe not yet. It all depended on whether she were alone. High chance she met Ragtime or Paprika, or even some of the soldiers. Midnight snacks weren’t that uncommon, especially not on such a long haul train. Apple whistled a cheerful tune, while picturing Rondeau in her pajama, walking back to the cabin with packaged toasts in her hands. The fact that his mind wasn’t automatically undressing her was a positive sign. It meant that his hormones were under complete control. That pleased him. It took time to learn, but now he could keep himself in check so much easier than before. He basked in the afterglow of his relief, rubbed his cheek on the pillow. That cot was more comfortable than it looked. It caressed his skin with its delicate fabric folds, letting him feel welcome and safe. Slowly, his eyes closed, his breath slowed down. The dance of the train tracks lulled him like a dream, letting him rest into the arms of Morpheus.

  His ears twitched.

  His eyes opened.

  His senses sharpened.

  Steps. Steps outside of his cabin. Unsteady. Heavy footwear, maybe boots. Two legs. Human. Not Rondeau. Closer. Closer. Closer. Fingers on the handle. Apple woke up completely, his relief, his bliss already forgotten. He stood up, slid on the floor, reached for the side of the door, concealed his breath. A clacking noise. A key being turned. No, that wasn’t Rondeau. Rondeau didn’t lock the cabin. She knew it. She had no reason to open it with a key. So, when the door went slightly ajar, silently, he prepared himself for the worst.

  He started counting down.

  Three.

  The door opened more, letting in a military boot.

  Two.

  A gray uniform peeked out of the dark.

  One.

  A knife. A shining knife held in one hand.

  Zero.

  The soldier didn’t even realize what happened. Didn’t manage to even catch a glimpse of it.

  One second before, he was standing at the door.

  The second after, he was sprayed on the floor.

  The legs of a fox clenched around his neck, suffocating him while his head was pulled up by slender fingers. He couldn’t shout. He couldn’t scream. There was not enough air for that. He tried to evade that grasp, he tried to pull himself out of it. All he obtained was to make his agony longer. His cheeks turned red, as consciousness started to fade. His muscles relaxed. His mind drew a blank. Foam sputtered from his lips, as the fox closed his grip around the soldier’s head, forcing his elbows against his victim’s temples, squeezing him between his legs even more. Spasms. Groans. Mutters. Twitches. A silent fight for what felt like minutes, instants stretched to hours.

  Then, nothing.

  He stopped moving.

  He stopped resisting.

  Apple didn’t relent. Apple didn’t let him go.

  And the soldier became dead weight, slumped like a sack of potatoes on the moquette, under the puzzled gaze of a fox.

  Apple’s ears twitched again.

  Steps. Other steps. Different. Softer. He sighed, let his back lay on the floor, while still keeping the unconscious soldier in check. In that exact moment, another figure peeked from the door. A figure wearing pajama pants and slippers, holding a packaged toast in her hands, together with a bottle of orange juice. A figure watching her naked fox clutching a soldier’s neck with his thighs, keeping his head captive among his arms, in what looked like a wrestling submission hold.

  Her eyes betrayed something akin to confusion. Massive. Confusion. She blinked. Once. Twice. Proffered the packaged sandwich.

  “…your toast with ham, cheese and peanut butter, Apple. Aaand here’s your juice.”

  The fox smirked at her, patted the head of the passed out man, whistled with admiration.

  “Look if it ain’t the best room service. You’d be cute in a maid outfit, Rondeau.”

  “In your wildest dreams.”

  “In my wildest dreams, you are wearing nothing but shackles, a choker, a fake cat tail and funny cat ears, so it’s absolutely not the same thing.”

  That image assaulted Rondeau for a long instant, seeping into her brain, causing her to blush slightly, before she managed to shake it out of her head.

  “Ugh, whatever! Now…”

  Rondeau sat in front of him, pinched the unconscious soldier’s nose, tilting it left and right.

  “…care to explain what happened while I was out?”

  [chapter:Cartridge 04: Power Plays]

  [i:Welcome to the lion’s cage]

  The board bistro had suddenly become more animated. It was the only carriage with enough room for so many people standing around, without them having to orderly seat in several consecutive rows. So, it was the only real choice when it came to the right place to gather all those involved. That meant, among others, Senator Hector Verhoven and Third Officer Immanuel Galland. Their gazes had met and clashed as soon as they both set foot in the bistro, wearing their impeccable fits as if they didn’t wake up in a hurry once the fire alarm rang. But that was just a ploy. As soon as they jumped out of their cabins, each of them was met by the imposing or less imposing figure of a fully garbed executioner—Ragtime for Galland, Rondeau for Verhoven—weapon in hand and ready to walk them around like dogs. So, there they were, again in the same room, against all the odds, trying to figure out who screwed up what.

  And being welcomed by the familiar shape of an army grunt, sprayed on the floor in a clear state of unconsciousness, under the careful watch of a male fox sitting close to him and wearing only a pair of ripped trousers that barely hanged below his hip line.

  Galland was the first to react, to squint his eyes at the sight of the captured soldier. His rough, synthesized voice blasted through his face veil, with unnatural echoes and reverbs accompanying what was supposed to be a passing imitation of a human tone.

  “That’s Private Haressen. Why is he here? What happened to him?”

  “You should tell me, sir.”

  Executioner Rondeau was wearing a serious expression for once, caressing the barrel of her shotgun in her lap. A handcuff peeked out of her right sleeve, dangling around her wrist as she held the weapon’s grip. She cleared her throat, continued just after a short interruption.

  “This guy broke into my cabin with a combat knife and was neutralized by Apple. Now, someone doesn’t barge into another person’s room with a fifteen centimeters blade if not to harm them, right?”

  Haressen’s wrists and ankles were tied together with what looked like a long black rope with several knots spread around it. Galland blinked for a long second, trying to make sense of that sight. He moved his gaze to Rondeau, then to Ragtime, then to Rondeau again, before focusing on the rope itself. Who in their right mind would bring a bloody rope in their luggage during a train trip? Paprika, sitting in a corner, sipped down a little bit of her tea, right as her ears twitched. She smiled at Galland, stared at him with an enigmatic gaze, raised her index finger in front of her lips, as if to command silence. Galland picked up that subtle non verbal message, decided to drop the topic. The satisfied grin of that fox made him uneasy enough not to push the matter further. So, instead, he focused his attention on Haressen. Bruises all around his neck, scratch marks on his face. He didn’t get to fight. He was neutralized too soon to retaliate. In normal circumstances, Galland would have applauded at that marvelous show of skill. The circumstances, though, were far from normal. Haressen was one of the two hundred soldiers on board, under his direct command. Now, he was lying unconscious before his eyes. That shouldn’t have happened.

  Rondeau studied his expression, the nervous gaze of a man that seemed as surprised as her by that turn of events. Galland was suspicious, if anything for how uncannily he resembled the person she saw in Genuya. She had a feeling her attempted murder was connected to it: after all, she was the only witness of that event, the only one that could cast a shadow of doubt on his impeccable military career. Still, that wasn’t the gaze of a man that just saw his plan crumble to dust. It was more like the expression of someone that was dealing with a completely unexpected turn of events. Her attention moved to Verhoven. He looked calm, almost unnaturally so. A subtle hint of anger here and there, while his eyes darted to Galland and back to the captured soldier. His voice broke the impasse, filling the restaurant room with its abrasive tone.

  “Galland, care to explain why one of your men tried to kill an Order executioner?”

  He clicked his tongue, pointed his finger at the official.

  “What did you want to hide? Is there anything we should talk about? Maybe… something about the involvement of the army in Genuya?”

  Galland kneeled down, close to Haressen’s face, examined it, touched his neck with his right hand. The shine of the metal attracted Apple’s eyes. It was as they said, then. Immanuel ‘half-face’ Galland had a mechanical prosthetic for his arm. The fact that his jaw was always covered by a black veil probably meant that it was scarred or disfigured too. A striking contrast with his delicate skin, his long, flowing black hair. Waltz would have killed to have hair that healthy and well coiffed. Galland’s artificial fingers moved on Haressen’s chin, then on its jaw, stopping on every bruise for a second or two. Then, stood up again, crossed his arms.

  “No clear signs of an injection or of jugger lumps…”

  Verhoven squinted his eyes, snickered.

  “Jugger lumps?”

  “A telltale sign of a late-stage jugger infection. Microscopic subcutaneous metal growths clumped around your blood vessels. They are pretty easy to detect, if you know what they feel like to the touch.”

  Verhoven tapped his foot on the floor, groaned under his breath.

  “Of course there aren’t any! All of the soldiers on board have been vaccinated, right? There’s no room for a jugger infection here! This man acted of his own volition, he was definitely not manipulated by an external, non-human actor! So, stop with your excuses and attempts at mudding the truth, Galland.”

  Galland didn’t even grace him with an answer. He simply kept staring at his soldier, inspecting his jaw.

  “At this point, we’ll need to wait for him to wake up and question him. We’re lucky he didn’t manage to bite his cyanide tooth.”

  His fingers moved inside Haressen’s mouth, touched one of his molars, twisted it around. It turned like a screw, coming off with little to no effort. Galland removed a small pill from inside the fake enamel case, then delicately secured it again, screwing it back in place. He observed the pill for a long instant, before crushing it among his metallic fingers, turning it into fine white dust.

  “I’ll have two of my soldiers lock Haressen into one of the unused carriages until he wakes up. Then, we’ll make him spill the beans.”

  Rondeau glanced at the army officer, met his eyes, in a staring contest that lasted an interminable instant.

  “So, what’s your take on this, Third Officer Galland?”

  “Three possibilities. The first: a personal feud with you. Maybe, you killed some of his friends or relatives during a jugger purge. The second: someone in the army sent him to silence a witness.”

  “That would include you as a potential suspect.”

  “It very much would, and that’s why I’m laying it bare: because denying that possibility would make me even more suspicious.”

  Rondeau clenched her fingers around Slaughterhouse Dog. Whatever the involvement Galland had in that attempted assassination, that was a smart move on his side. Not denying. Not deflecting. Owning it. That made his position harder to attack, until the truth was ascertained.

  “The third possibility is a covert operation to make it look like the army wanted to silence you. That would, of course, make the Order or even the government prime suspects for it.”

  Verhoven felt the pressure of Galland’s gaze on him, steadied his fists, replied with a smirk.

  “Trust me, officer, the government has no interest in sullying your reputation—you are good enough at doing it on your own. After all, we aren’t the ones with something to lose, if the witness report of Executioner Rondeau reaches the wide public, right?”

  Verhoven pointed his index at him, without ever changing expression.

  “And that’s why I want to be the one who chooses the soldiers that handle Haressen. If you do that, Galland, I’m sure you would use that chance to silence him. Do you have anything against it?”

  Galland faced him in silence for ten long, interminable seconds. Then, his hand went for Verhoven’s neck, almost closed around it. Almost. It stopped, just bare millimeters from touching it, from having a direct contact with the other man’s skin. Then, as suddenly as it started, the aborted grip ended. Galland’s hand fell limp, as his eyes kept staring into Verhoven’s soul. His voice seeped through his face mask, breathed through the carriage.

  “Do as you please, Verhoven. Feel free to dig your own grave. I’ll go wait in my cabin.”

  He turned around, walking away from the center of the room. He stopped shortly before leaving, pondering for a couple of seconds. Apple’s ears twitched. The fox closed his eyes, nodded in silence. Then, Galland resumed his path, walking through the entrance door, letting his cape waver in the still atmosphere that haunted the train.

  **

  Haressen was confused. His last memory was entering the executor’s room to kill her with his combat knife. So, how did it come to that? Why was he handcuffed and being held like a sack of potatoes by two other soldiers? Dizziness pervaded his body, clouded his mind. He couldn’t move. He couldn’t govern his limbs as he used to. Nevertheless, even in that barely conscious state, he realized that he had failed. Somehow, his attempt at taking the executioner’s life was thwarted. He groaned, sputtered. His comrades. His comrades were bringing him somewhere. Maybe for interrogation. Maybe to get rid of him. Couldn’t they see it, the necessity of his actions? Didn’t they feel it too? The absurdly sharp pain that pierced them? Yes. Rondeau. Ragtime. Those two Order dogs… their mere presence was causing an unquenchable pain, flaring through his nerves, spreading like wildfire. Headaches, splitting migraines. Whenever those two were around. Whenever they came close. It had to be those tattoos of theirs. Wicked black magic that corroded a man’s soul. Haressen was sure of it, so he had to act. To stop the pain. To stop the migraines. Stop the feeling of being devoured from inside out that assaulted him every time he was in the same room with one of them. Rondeau, Ragtime. A distinction without a difference. He needed silence. He wanted silence. He couldn’t live in pain. Not because of them. Not because of…

  Something flowed through his lips.

  A taste of iron.

  Blood.

  His own blood?

  And.

  And from his ears.

  What?

  No.

  NO.

  NO!

  The headache.

  Splitting.

  Headache.

  His whole body felt like on fire.

  His muscles.

  His bones.

  Everything.

  He opened his eyes, his pupils shrank to dots.

  A shriek filled the air, escaped his lips.

  He twitched,

  There was no executioner, just his fellow soldiers. Just them. Just them. Just them. They shrieked too, let him go in surprise, let him fall to the ground. Shouts, guns cocked, a pager. But Haressen didn’t see. Haressen didn’t ear. Haressen simply

  Didn’t.

  And, when metal burst out of his flesh, the last fragment of his mind did too.

  The pain, the head-splitting pain, had finally stopped.

  [chapter:Cartridge 05: Engine Break]

  [i:Life and death dance on a thin red line]

  A cacophony of beeps invaded the board bistro, blaring inside it from two, three, five pagers. It happened all of a sudden, not even twenty minutes after Haressen was carried away. Rondeau and Apple were already gone, while Verhoven and five more soldiers were still warming their seats in the restaurant. Then, every device started blasting annoying beeps at full volume, disturbing the night quiet and destroying it, maybe forever. Paprika plugged her ears with her hands, keeping a refined smile on, hiding the subtle suffering that high-pitched sounds inflicted to her. Her tea time was unfortunately over, as the worst case scenario played in front of her eyes. Panic. Shouts. Gunfire through the radio. Ordinary business, but nonetheless frustrating. She was already looking forward to making use of her expertly hand-crafted shibari rope harness with her mastress. The thought of being enveloped by the delicate embrace of those knots and strings all over her skin, letting them caress every inch of her intimacy, was the ultimate sublimation of a boring train trip. That alluring perspective was abruptly replaced with yet another hunting mission, much to her chagrin But it was fine, as long as they could have a good time later. A hand tapped on her shoulder, a hand she recognized by its pressure alone, by the pattern the fingers followed in their touch. She smiled at her mastress, still protecting her ears by the absolute bedlam of voices.

  “Oh my, I imagine it is time for a friendly purge, Mastress Ragtime?”

  As an answer, Ragtime unholstered her twin uzis, tied with a long strip of fabric by their grips, handed one of them to her. Both of them had the name Thespian Drama etched on their casings, in squared, regular letters. Paprika closed her hand around the weapon she was given, caressing the inscription. Ragtime got closer, their face veil mere centimeters away from the fox’s twitching nose. The executioner whispered, as close as possible to Paprika’s ears, only for her to hear.

  “Shall we dance, Rikarika?”

  Paprika chuckled softly, bit Ragtime’s nose behind the veil.

  “That we shall, whenever you’re ready. In and out of bed—with you always, my dear.”

  Then, she held their hand in hers and raised the gun. Ragtime raised her uzi too, in a perfectly coordinated motion with her partner, as the strip between the weapons unrolled, almost like a gymnast’s ribbon. Ragtime’s voice resonated in the board bistro, louder than a gunshot.

  “Alright, pals. Who’s having a headache right now? I’m talking a splitting migraine, as if your head were exploding. Anyone?”

  The soldiers looked at each other, then at the weird duo, then at Verhoven. The senator was pale in his face, sweating all over his forehead. His teeth clattered, his eyes were startled, his gaze uncertain. Denial. Plain denial. It couldn’t go like that. There was no way he heard that word.

  Juggernaut.

  Over the radio.

  “Haressen has hatched.”

  That wasn’t possible.

  Haressen was vaccinated. He didn’t have—how did Galland call them? Jugger lumps? And he was under constant monitoring for days, before that mission. Or was he? Did the medical center in Cordo make a mistake? Did they test for the wrong markers? Two hundred soldiers were many, too many to follow with that level of precision. Did any doctors there cut corners? Was it because of his budget reviews and deductions? A sudden movement captured his attention. One of the soldiers had raised her arm. Verhoven didn’t care about her name or rank, just that she raised her arm. He could see an uncertain expression opening on her face. Young, barely twenty. Minute. Shivering.

  “I… I have been suffering from migraines for… for the past couple of days. They started… all of a sudden, but the doctors said that it was expected as a possible side effect.”

  His sight remained locked on her, on her delicate traits, on her almost teen-like qualities. Ragtime, though, didn’t seem to care about them. Their voice thundered, roared in the bistro one more time.

  “Anybody else? Look, I’m doing this for your good. So, please… be honest.”

  Another hand rose up. An older guy, maybe in his forties, with a square jaw, rough skin. His voice was low, as imposing as his figure.

  “Sporadic painful headaches, sir. For the last three days too.”

  Nobody else replied. Only those two soldiers out of five. Ragtime nodded at Paprika, waited for her to respond in kind, before turning around again to face the small crowd.

  “Does your pain get worse, if I come close?”

  They walked slowly towards the soldiers, measuring every step, watching them in their eyes. The massive man stared back without any visible reaction, until his teeth started to clatter. The minute girl bit her lip, averted her gaze, shivered.

  “Then?”

  “Y… yes. Yes! It… it hurts! It hurts a lot!”

  “What about you, big guy?”

  “…yes.”

  “Cool.”

  Ragtime walked back to the center of the room, without ever leaving Paprika’s hold. Then, both of them aimed their guns in unison. And pulled the trigger in perfect synchronicity.

  **

  Slaughterhouse Dog barked a second, a third time. Whatever was left of Haressen was splattered on the wall, riddled with holes, leaking blood all over the floor. Of its six original legs, only two remained. Its casing was breached, letting Rondeau get a peek at its malformed internal organs. A weak jugger, even for the standards of a juvenile. Its shell was thin, easy to crack. Its speed was subpar. Its reflexes too. Rondeau reloaded her rifle one more time, aiming it at the defenseless pile of metallic scrap and biologic matter.

  “…till the gods forgive you.”

  A loud blast breached the silence.

  Where the machine lay, now only a pool of nondescript ooze and wreckage, soaked in red. Rondeau rested her finger on the trigger, took a deep breath. That jugger wasn’t fully developed. It had to have hatched prematurely before applying the finishing touches. Now, though, there was a bigger problem on her hands. She turned around to face the soldiers, the two guys that reported the hatching. Scared. She could see it in their eyes. They were scared shitless. Looking at her, looking at each other, looking at her again. She inhaled, exhaled, fastened her gun back to her belt. Her hand browsed her uniform’s right pocket taking a small device out of it. It was a metallic box bigger than a pager, but could still fit in her hand. Pinholes and grids dotted one of its sides. She pushed a button on it, pointed it at the two men standing behind her. The small display showed some numbers, barely moving above zero. She pushed the button again, slid the device back to where it came from.

  “You two are clean. Or, at least, you ain’t gonna hatch now. No weird chem traces, but you might have been infected—so, as soon as we stop, you immediately go and get a check-up, okay?”

  The soldiers nodded, raised their hands in a perfect military salute.

  “Yes sir!”

  “G… got it!”

  Rondeau examined their faces. Young-ish, both of them, in their mid twenties. Both taller than her. That made her slightly envious, especially because Apple was still taller than all of them—making her the smallest in the carriage. She turned back to the corpse of the jugger. Apple was kneeling close to it, smelling its remains. Rondeau froze, watching him get near the pools of blood, the broken carcass of what once was a human being.

  “Apple!”

  Her voice roared, all her muscles tensed.

  “Stay away from it! It’s still infective! Fresh out of the oven!”

  Apple rolled his eyes, shook his head.

  “Rondeau, for the last time: foxes are unjuggerable, ‘kay? We’re made for this. So, stop it.”

  “N… no! You know that there are… that there are exceptions! That there are… that there are faulty…”

  She wanted to go on, before her tongue froze. Before she swallowed back those words. Before Apple interrupted them with his own soothing voice.

  “Look, I already licked your blood once or twice—heck, even after that beekeeper slashed you open—and nothing happened, right? Let me do my job.”

  “O… one drop of my blood… that’s too little to… but this jugger… this jugger…”

  Shivering. She was shivering. Visibly shivering. Breathing heavily. Her hands couldn’t stand still. Her eyes blinked way too fast. Apple noticed it, picked up the signals, stood up, got away from the smashed body, waved his hand at her.

  “Here, happy now?”

  Rondeau seemed to calm down. Slowly. One breath at a time. Slowly. Yes, slowly. Slowly she turned back to her usual self. Her worry replaced by relief.

  “…yes. Yes, I’m happy now. But why did you… why did you do that?”

  Apple whipped his tail, rubbed his chin.

  “This jugger doesn’t smell like one, Rondeau.”

  “Huh?”

  “It still smells like a human… and I can’t understand why.”

  [chapter:Cartridge 06: No Way Out]

  [i:You should have got out while you had the chance]

  Verhoven shrieked, fell on his back, started shaking like flag in the wind. The soldiers. Those two soldiers that raised their hands.

  Were dead.

  Riddled with bullets.

  Their eyes were still wide open.

  Their mouth agape.

  Their uniforms caked with their own blood.

  All while the scarecrow—the executioner was towering over them, like a vulture soaring on a soon-to-be-corpse. They were moving their fingers on those lifeless remains, inspecting the wounds, delving their hand deep into the flesh, pulling out small scraps of black metal at irregular intervals. Their fox kept a small device in her hand, something that looked like a box closed with a grid. Her other hand caressed the executioner’s shoulder, leaning on it gently.

  “Pray, my dear mastress, what is the diagnosis?”

  Ragtime gazed at the device, then back at the bodies, under the horrified gaze of the other soldiers, of Verhoven himself.

  “…this is… weird. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen something like this before.”

  The big guy’s face was still contracted in a grimace of terror, the last expression that crossed his features before being gunned down by Thespian Drama. The bodily fluids that flowed out of his wounds were darker than blood, more viscous even. Small metallic crystals were mixed into them, in structures that were maybe a tenth of a millimeter in size. Metal had devoured the soft tissues under his skin, peeking out of the wounds like a cracked, broken shell. Yet, the detector was mute. No beeps, no lights blinking. All the effects of a late stage jugger infection, with none of the usual telltale signs. Ragtime glanced at the detector one more time. They snatched it from Paprika’s hands, brought it closer to the bodies of the two human beings that had almost ceased being human. Nothing. No reaction.

  Ragtime sighed, stared at the three surviving soldiers, at Verhoven too.

  “So, if you’re having a headache when I come close to you, know you’re going to hatch soon and that it won’t be pretty. I can let you rest in peace and do it quickly, like for your comrades here. Before you ask, there’s no cure. Once you reach the splitting migraine phase, you are done and gone. So, your choice becomes dying at my hand before or after hatching. I’d suggest before, so that you can’t spread the infection further.”

  Before any of them could answer, Ragtime moved away from the massive body of the man and sunk her hand inside the ribcage of the dead young woman, piercing it as it if were butter. Pulling out a fully formed metallic spider leg, soaked in blood.

  “See? Your innards have already been eaten. So, be brave good boys and let me kill you before you infect other innocent people.”

  The soldiers looked at each other, looked at the executioner, looked at Verhoven, then at each other again. One of the three shivered, swallowed a lump of saliva.

  “I… I’m fine! Totally fine! I haven’t had any adverse effects! I swear!”

  “Y… yeah, I too! No migraines! I’m not infected!”

  “Same! Same! I’m fine! I’m still a human! And… and I’m vaccinated!”

  Ragtime whistled, aimed their finger at the corpses.

  “Well, they were vaccinated too—look what good it did to them. But okay, fine. I won’t shoot you, as long as you don’t hatch.”

  Verhoven rose on his feet, snickered, sputtered, cleaned his lips with the sleeve of his shirt. He pushed his hand on his forehead, wiped the sweat away. Calm down, Hector. Calm down. There had to be an explanation, right? The soldiers were all vaccinated. True, it was just an experimental serum, but the results were promising. So, how? How come they turned into juggers too? And how many of them were already walking corpses? That made no sense, unless someone conspired to turn them. Unless someone pulled the strings behind his back.

  Unless…

  A jolt of pain traversed his head at that realization. He gritted his teeth, slammed his fist on the floor.

  “Galland! It must be be him!”

  Everyone turned around, everyone looked at Verhoven, at his bleeding knuckles, at his demonic grimace.

  “He must have infected his soldiers, after replacing the vaccine with active jugger nanos! Yes! It checks out! He’s the mastermind behind it, that bastard!”

  The soldiers looked at each other, before turning their attention to Verhoven, to his twitching muscles, his blinking eyes.

  “B… but sir, Officer Galland didn’t have any reasons to…”

  “Then why? Why was he in Genuya? Why did Executioner Rondeau meet him there? It’s logical! There’s no other explanation!”

  Verhoven raised his finger, screamed from the bottom of his lungs.

  “He’s a traitor! He’s working for the Maltaise government! He was paid to sabotage our diplomatic mission and steal our precious cargo to hand it over to those rats in Valletta! I…”

  “Verhoven.”

  Ragtime’s voice broke through that onslaught of words, their uzi aimed squarely at his jaw.

  “Maybe, it’s time you tell us more about this… ‘diplomatic mission’ of yours. What are we carrying on this train? And why did you have all our soldiers take an experimental jugger vaccine? There are no juggers in the Mediterranean corridor and we could have screened the infected using our usual sensors. But no, you had all of them injected with some dubious, untested serum. So, why? Spill the beans, will you?”

  “I…”

  Verhoven felt something around his neck, tightening, cutting his breath. A rope. A piece of rope with several knots, closing around his throat. He screamed, he screamed as soon as the pressure mounted, compressing his airways. He glanced at the side, met the mischievous gaze of a fox. Smiling. She was smiling, while pulling the ends of the rope, while suffocating him every second more. That was Paprika. Ragtime’s fox. Almost smothering him to his death. Ragtime caressed her ears with their free hand, rubbed her cheek with their fingers, winked at her. Paprika blew a kiss at them in response, all while bringing Verhoven down to his knees, pushing her foot on the back of his right leg.

  Ragtime’s voice thundered in the bistro.

  “What. Are we. Carrying. In the last carriage?”

  The soldiers stared without saying anything, paralyzed in terror at the idea of defying Ragtime. Their pagers blared again, a constant flow of messages ran through them. Then, the noises stopped. The beeps too. Instead, a green light flared up on the devices, as if to mean ‘emergency over’. Ragtime smirked under their face mask. Rondeau had been efficient as usual—that gal surely knew how to smash juggers with style. Still, the main problem, the ‘why’, remained. That was what Verhoven had to answer, while his face turned cyanotic due to the lack of oxygen.

  “I don’t have the whole night, Verhoven. The truth. Now.”

  A high-pitched shriek emerged from his throat, in a mix of pain and despair.

  “J… jugger seeds!”

  Paprika relented her grip, let him breathe.

  “We’re carrying… jugger seeds! One… one thousand freeze-dried juggernaut seeds! It was… it’s our bargaining chip for… better trade agreements!”

  Ragtime fought their instinct, the momentary rage that made them almost pull the trigger. Their hand trembled, their finger too. Then came the slap. A slap with the butt of her uzi, right on Verhoven cheek.

  “Jugger… seeds.”

  They breathed. Slowly. Slowly. Before slapping Verhoven back on the other cheek, again with the butt of their uzi.

  “You absolute idiots! You’ve learned nothing? Jugger seeds? Really? Hades swallow you!”

  Their hand closed around his collar, almost to the point of lifting him up.

  “Come with me! Now! We need to go there with Rondeau immediately!”

  “The train… we should stop the…”

  “Heck no! If we stop the train and one more of our soldiers hatches, we might spread juggers in a jugger-free area! The train must reach Valletta, no matter what! With or without you alive!”

  “But… but…”

  Ragtime snapped their fingers. The rope around Verhoven’s neck got tighter under Paprika’s expert guidance. He shouted, sputtered all over the place.

  “Alright! Alright! Please, don’t kill me! I’m just following orders! I’m just…”

  “Shut up.”

  Ragtime turned back to the soldiers, looked at each of them.

  “You, in the middle. There’s a chance you’re going to hatch. You couldn’t hide your pain well enough, when I came close—it’s useless to deny it. You’re not terminal yet, like the two who died, so there’s a chance we can still save you.”

  The soldier in the middle jolted, gasped, took two steps back. Still, Ragtime kept pointing their fingers at him, aiming their uzi at his chest.

  “You’ll keep an eye on Verhoven for me and carry him around behind Paprika, yes? I promise I’ll bring you to an Order doctor after all of this is over, if you’re still alive. Say no and I kill you on the spot instead.”

  Ragtime’s eyes darted to the other soldiers, still trying to process all what had just happened.

  “You two? You’re perfectly fine for now. Stay here and stop everyone who tries to reach the engine room. Use violence, if necessary. Oh, and page all of your comrades, now. Gather all who are healthy enough, but don’t tell them why. If anyone says they have a migraine, tell them that Verhoven ordered them to stay put in their cabins until the emergency is over.”

  The executioner grabbed Verhoven by his collar, pulled him together with Paprika.

  “Now, let’s go, before Rondeau unleashes even more hades on this bloody train.”

  [chapter:Cartridge 07: Dead Man Crossing]

  [i:The solution to the trolley problem is not facing it at all]

  “…this one is clean too, Rondeau.”

  Apple stretched a little, cracked his knuckles. Several soldiers were standing in front of him, all of them with a small cut on their left cheek. Apple licked his lips, spat on the ground. The taste of blood was annoying and made him wish he didn’t have to use this tongue to analyze it. Still, that was his one way to be sure of a jugger infection. The small alterations in the blood composition, the microcrystals forming inside the vessels right before hatching—the only way to be sure without dissecting a body or performing a full x-ray scan. Apple had to adjust his receptors on his own blood as a baseline—fully clean of jugger toxins. Among other things, foxes were still an exceedingly good reference value for gauging the infection’s stage in humans. Of the fourteen soldiers he had licked blood from, ten were clean or healthy carriers, two were terminal and two were clearly infected. Yet, none of them triggered the portable sensors. The chemical detectors were simply not cooperating, not showing any of the usual reads even on the deceased jugger. It was something that bothered him, that bothered Rondeau too. What to do with the four infected was also hard to gauge. They could hatch at any moment, so killing them might have been the most merciful choice.

  There was just one problem.

  Third Officer Immanuel Galland.

  Standing in front of them, with his arms crossed, gazing at Rondeau and Apple with chilling coldness. He had to be tested too, of course, but he simply didn’t allow it, keeping his distance from them. Apple had been confused by that sudden change of heart. Before leaving the bistro, Galland had whispered something like “come to my cabin later. We need to talk.” His whispers had been barely audible, almost like muttering. But Apple picked them up, word for word. Galland knew something and seemed ready to tell the full story. Nevertheless, he was now refusing to cooperate, contrary to the expectations that previous opening generated. Apple stared at him, at his weirdly curious eyes. Galland was a fascinating specimen. His handicaps and prosthetics told a story that not many knew, one that piqued the interest of almost everyone around him.

  “Officer Galland, I need to test your blood too. Please, don’t make things harder than they should...”

  “There’s no need for that. I know I’m infected. I’ve been infected for years.”

  Silence. Apple fell into an uncomfortable silence. Rondeau too, barely managing to contain her surprise at that sudden revelation. Galland squinted his yes, shook his head.

  “I’m a healthy carrier, just like your mistress—but my tattoo is just a shielding one, not a resonant system. Anyway, that’s the reason why I wear this mask and gloves... on my last biological hand, that is. Helps avoid spreading the infection.”

  Rondeau’s jaw almost dropped to the floor. The soldiers around her started buzzing like a concerto of mosquitos, talking with each other, pointing fingers at their superior officer, whispering in disbelief. Rondeau stuttered, turned to face him, tilted her head up to meet his gaze.

  “All carriers of the jugger nano-infection must be monitored by the Order! How come you…”

  “There are agreements you aren’t privy to. Agreements you are not supposed to be familiar with. That’s it, Rondeau. That’s why I wanted to talk to you in private… about Genuya too. But it’s hardly time for that. It will have to wait.”

  He walked between Apple and Rondeau, kneeled on the remains of what once was Haressen. His fingers caressed the broken metal, followed its jagged contour slowly, with measured care. Trembling. As if each of his fingers was an extension of his sadness.

  “I inspected Haressen in the bistro. He had no lumps. No chemical signatures either… but he hatched anyway. In a severely weakened form—deformed, even. Look. Look at the shape of this leg. Have you ever seen a jugger leg so weakly bound together, Rondeau? No, this isn’t normal. Juvenile juggers are not this… messy, even in the most painful births. This can mean only one thing…”

  His irises zeroed on Rondeau, locked on hers.

  “…that stupid vaccine is just good at suppressing the symptoms while the infection spreads unhindered—no, even accelerated! It’s not only useless, it’s harmful: it destroys all the usual signs of an ongoing mutation… and the jugger that hatches out of a ‘vaccinated’ shell comes out malformed too! This serum doesn’t save the human and damages the newborn juggernaut at the same time. The worst of both worlds.”

  He clenched his mechanical fist, almost to the point of grinding its gears.

  “This makes my blood boil, Rondeau, in ways you can’t imagine. This… poison condemns the shell to a painful death and the juggernaut to a stunted birth. There’s no winner. Whoever designed it is a criminal. Whoever faked the tests to make it look functional… even more so.”

  Rondeau couldn’t avert her gaze from him, from that rage that seeped through all of his pores. That was genuine, unadulterated anger. Still, she had to ask. She had to pull that question out of her throat.

  “…what are we carrying on this train, Officer Galland? Heck, why did your soldiers even need an ‘experimental vaccine’?! What’s the real reason why executioners were required for this mission?! The Mediterranean Corridor is a jugger-free zone! There was no need to…”

  “The government wants to hand in one thousand frozen jugger seeds to the Maltaise Coalition in exchange for a special trade agreement… or, at least that was the idea. It was a highly classified military secret, of course—but, now that juggers are involved, you Order dogs have the leading authority, right? So, I might as well volunteer all the information you’d extort from me anyway.”

  “Jugger… seeds? But…”

  Rondeau’s fingers trembled over the trigger. The broken chain of her handcuff chimed too, as the rings oscillated like a pendulum.

  “…isn’t that against all of our international treaties? A-after all, it’s our country that created…”

  Galland crunched his metallic fist, almost to the point of breaking his fingers.

  “I’d say we have more pressing matters to deal with. Newborn juggers are attracted by their own kind. If more soldiers hatch, they’ll try to open the container and…”

  Rondeau’s mind connected the dots, her hands closed around the grip of Slaughterhouse Dog, hugging its profile with as much strength as she could muster. She interrupted Galland, didn’t let him finish.

  “…and release their one thousand unborn friends through the Corridor. That would be… absolutely catastrophic.”

  “Oh, from the point of view of the juggers, that’s actually a blessing. More virgin soil to bloom. It’s purely a question of perspectives, Rondeau: you’ve seen what happened in Genuya, right? That community was pretty tight-knit. An interesting social experiment, if you will.”

  Rondeau raised her weapon, trained it on Galland. Slaughterhouse Dog’s safety was down, its barrels shining in the lights of the carriage.

  “Officer Galland, siding with juggers is high treason. You, of all people, should know.”

  “Trust me, Rondeau, if anyone should be accused of high treason, that would be…”

  The door of the carriage opened, as a blue uniform emerged from it, together with a ragged hat and a face mask, dreadlocks flowing on its shoulders. A fox with braided hair followed suit, dragging a balding, shivering man on the floor. Both the executioner and the fox carried a uzi in one hand, joined by a long strip of fabric. Galland turned his attention to the newcomers, snapped his metallic fingers.

  “Speak of the sinner. Care to join the conversation, Verhoven? We were just talking about your involvement in this mess.”

  Verhoven growled like a caged beast, stomped his foot on the ground, stood up by calling all the energies he had left. He stumbled down, put a hand on his forehead, breathed heavily. Headache. That was a damn headache. Perfect, just the right moment. Of all the times he had to suffer from headaches, that. Whatever, he thought, he could deal with it later.

  “My involvement?! You are the mind behind all of this Galland! Only you could have sabotaged my vaccination campaign for your gain!”

  He raised his finger, pointed it angrily at Galland. His hand was trembling, his veins popping. He looked unsteady, as if his head were heavy, as if his movements were delayed. Still, he didn’t stop. He simply steeled his teeth, fighting against the pain.

  “Before you entered the picture, everything was going perfectly! The clinical tests were a success! There were no symptoms, and…”

  “The absence of symptoms is all what your Yuvia-forsaken vaccine does, Verhoven! It suppresses the symptoms, but that’s it!”

  “Then, why didn’t the doctors find anything strange with our soldiers?!”

  “Because someone bribed them not to spread the news and keep the results under wraps, maybe? Someone with a big stake in the pharmaceutical company that produced the ‘vaccine’?”

  Galland snapped his metallic fingers, pointed his index at Verhoven in a gesture similar to his.

  “…someone like you.”

  Verhoven’s teeth clattered, his gums compressed almost to the point of bleeding.

  “That’s stupid! Why would I pay a bunch of doctors to hide the truth, when my life is at stake?! I… I don’t want to be infected! I have a senate seat to get back to and now I’m surrounded by potential plague spreaders! So, tell me! Why should have I done that? What’s my gain, if I’m dead?! Which benefits can my corpse reap?!”

  “Who’s the biggest investor in the life insurance sector, Verhoven? Please, tell me.”

  “Oh, come on!”

  Ragtime rolled their eyes, looked at Rondeau with a gaze that betrayed restiveness, in an unvoiced question that could be intended as can I shoot both of them? Rondeau waved her hand as if to ask them to wait a second longer, raising her gun too to express a like-minded wish. Before them, the politician and the officer were still trading verbal blows, getting louder and louder each second longer. In the meantime, Paprika started wrapping the long ribbon of Thespian Drama around her body, squealing a little in the process, kissing Ragtime’s ear, rubbing her cheek against theirs. Rondeau gulped down a lump of saliva at that view, forcing herself not to think about Apple doing the same in his birthday suit. Having seen him naked so many times should have desensitized her to the sight of his body, but no—the effect it had on her was always the same, as if a crate of fireworks had blown up between her legs and broke the dam, freeing a colossal waterfall and let it flow unhindered. Still, that was no moment to have wet dreams about her fox, as alluring as it might have been. She had to keep her attention of the dynamic duo, before the situation became even worse. Maybe, Ragtime was right. Maybe, shooting both of them was the one possible solution, after all. As that thought crossed her mind, Verhoven, stomped his foot on the ground once again.

  “Shut up, Galland! All this talk is making my migraine worse! I feel like my head’s exploding! I’m a filthy coward, okay? I’m the most hypochondriac person in this carriage and I’m scared of those machine bastards! There’s nothing I prize more than my life! NOTHING! I would never risk it by stepping on a train full of potential juggers! You can’t seriously think I would!”

  Galland squinted his eyes, crossed his arms. He shook his head, let out a long sigh.

  “…of all the times to manage to come up with a good excuse…”

  He chuckled under his face cover, tilted his head a little.

  “You are right, Verhoven. I’ve never met a bigger coward than you. Congratulations, in normal circumstances you would have dug your way out of this...”

  Galland stepped forward, in an elegant movement that caused his cape to flap.

  “…I mean, if you actually weren’t a jugger in disguise.”

  “A…”

  “Jugger lumps. I sensed them before, when I almost grabbed your neck. They resonated with my artificial hand. I thought I was wrong, but now I’m certain. You’re terminal, Verhoven. You’ve been terminal even before boarding this train… and, maybe, you infected all of the soldiers yourself. So, just hatch and let us finish this.”

  Verhoven’s mouth fell agape.

  “N-no? Th-this can’t be real! I’m… I’m not a jugger! I’m…”

  “How’s your migraine, by the way? Head-splitting, maybe?”

  Verhoven’s eyes widened, his teeth clattered. His hand pressed on his forehead, his breath ragged. Rondeau’s finger froze on the trigger, Ragtime raised her uzi. Those words felt ominous. Those words stabbed their hearts like ice blades. The safety clicked. The barrels trained.

  Still.

  They couldn’t do.

  Anything.

  Because, in that instant.

  A high pitched shriek.

  Metal erupting from flesh.

  Spikes and black wires bursting out of the body.

  In that moment.

  In that infinitely long, short atom of time.

  Verhoven.

  Hatched open.

  [chapter:Cartridge 08: Siren Head]

  [i:Dance in the shadows of your torn existence]

  Hector Verhoven wasn’t a paragon of courage. He wasn’t a paragon of honesty. He wasn’t even a paragon of devotion to a cause. Simply enough, Hector Verhoven wasn’t a paragon of anything. The only thing he excelled at was smooth talking, and even then he was mediocre at best. In all of his political life, his most defining trait was not having any defining traits, bouncing on and off majority and minority parties, driven by the thrill of being the one to cast the last vote to kill a resolution or an expensive project. There was absolutely nothing special about Hector Verhoven, nothing of value that would have been recorded in history books.

  So, how come

  the jugger that hatched from him

  was so

  unusual?

  Rondeau took some distance from it, baring the barrels of Slaughterhouse Dog, resting her finger on the trigger, preparing to pull it.

  A roar deafened the carriage, as a shower of pellets ripped through what once was flesh, piercing the metal, ripping off chunks of entrails from its biological innards. A second shot. The perfectly steam-ironed suit of Verhoven bursted into a cloud of scraps and blood, sullying the shining body slowly emerging from inside him. Rondeau stopped to reload, put the second clip in.

  That wasn’t enough.

  The jugger she was seeing was anything but normal.

  Six legs, sure. Six legs that already shed the poor remains of that third rate politician and now towered over the mashed soup of his soft tissue.

  But it wasn’t the usual compact, almost ovoidal figure.

  That jugger was.

  Elongated.

  More like a scorpion.

  Rondeau shot again, lacerating the surface of the black metal, puncturing it. Still, that shell, that last layer of protection, wasn’t yielding to her will. A wide slash surprised her, a tail out of nowhere. Rondeau cursed, rolled out of range, right as a spear-like appendage pierced the floor of the carriage. She wiped her lips, looked at the writhing mass of tubes and plates surrounding whatever organic tissue remained of Verhoven. An imposing shape, with a spiked tail and a growth that looked like a small loudspeaker on what she supposed to be its head. Red light patterns flashed all over its surface, blinking in and out of existence, sending signals only it could understand. Buzzing noises. A broken radio, the same static whirring and droning all over the empty space. The jugger stumbled on its legs, staggering left and right, waving like a drunken sailor. Then, its loudspeaker blossomed like a flower, turning into something resembling an emergency siren.

  And a horrifying, high-pitched shriek bled through the air.

  Rondeau covered her left ear, cursed, raised her gun again. Shouts. Cries. All around her. She turned back, looked at the other people gathered. The soldiers. Some of them, those infected… they were bent in half, with their heads among their hands. Wailing. Screaming too.

  Till one burst open.

  And Slaughterhouse Dog ended its newborn jugger life in one shot, in a mess of blood, metal and gore. Rondeau’s eyes widened, she gritted her teeth, growled.

  “Apple! Paprika! Ragtime! Bring them out! Bring them out now, or they’re all gonna hatch! Quick!”

  Apple didn’t wait for her to finish, jumped on the first downed soldier, dragged him towards the door, launched him through it. Ragtime followed immediately, Paprika too, each dragging out one of the men or women squirming, convulsing, writhing on the floor. The other soldiers, the healthy ones, followed through, leaving the carriage behind, dragging their pained comrades, leaving Rondeau alone. She snickered, spat on the ground.

  Resonance.

  That jugger was using resonance to force the others to hatch. Just like an executioner’s mere presence would trigger them. Just like that. Rondeau gulped down a lump of saliva, as her fox and his companions evacuated the carriage, bringing away the potential victims. That thing. That thing was using the same principle as her tattoo to force juggers to reveal themselves and emerge from their mortal shell, emitting sounds that resonated with their inner cores. That made some shred of sense, in a twisted way: Verhoven was a politican, all talk and no action. That his jugger could call his kin to life…

  A loud bang.

  The jugger oscillated, recoiled, as a gunshot chipped away at its armored spine, as its ‘head’ turned to meet the assailant. A silver-coated gun, kept steady in an artificial hand, the barrel still smoking. Another shot, grazing the loudspeaker. Rondeau moved her gaze in the direction of the assailant. To her absolute surprise, it was Galland. Yes, Immanuel Galland was shooting at the creature with his own weapon, standing still while all other soldiers ran away like scared chinchillas. He wasn’t trembling. He wasn’t even sweating. He simply stood there, with his gun trained on the weird specimen, almost perfectly still. Rondeau admired his confidence for a long second, before focusing back on the monster. That gun Galland had? It could do jack to a jugger of that type. A placebo. No better than a paintball rifle. Still, in her heart, she applauded that veiled man for having the balls of standing in front of a jugger without crapping his pants. She smirked, slid her finger on the trigger. It was time to show him why she was an executioner and he was just a third rate officer. She roared at it, waved her hand at the monster.

  “Hey, you Verhoven bastard! Look, I’m the enemy, yes?”

  The creature that was once Verhoven reacted to its former name, stepped toward Rondeau. Slaughterhouse Dog barked, shrapnel showered its body, scrapping its coating away, exposing some of its innards, spreading fragments of its organs around the carriage. But the jugger kept advancing, kept wailing, the siren on its head kept shrieking gibberish that sounded almost human-like, almost like a voice. Verhoven’s voice. Distorted. Altered. But still his voice. Half words, syllables, shouted and spread like a disease from the loudspeaker. Rondeau stepped back one more time, checked the ammo counter. That resilience, that determination… that wasn’t normal. That wasn’t a common adult jugger. It was an anomaly, much like the beekeeper. And yet, despite having been shot so many times, pierced to smithereens, it still moved, dragged its body on the carriage, one centimeter, one step at a time.

  It crawled.

  It didn’t budge one inch.

  Despite its body falling apart.

  A true juggernaut, in name and in deed.

  She aimed her weapon at her target, ready to unleash her shotgun on it, on that deformed speaker coming out of its ‘head’. Slaughterhouse Dog barked again. An explosion shredded the jugger’s armor, broke several parts of its body. More and more of its organic heart was exposed for her eyes to see. Yet, that didn’t stop it. That didn’t even slow it down. Its ‘head’ was intact, protected by some sort of petals. The Verhoven-jugger was shaking its body violently, shaking its scorpion-like tail around, while blood poured out of the damaged carcass, of the dented panels that covered its flesh and metal body. Rondeau raised her weapon one more time, aimed it at the growth that emitted those pained, senseless sounds. Before she could pull the trigger, the shrieks became louder.

  Unbearably louder.

  She felt her whole being jolting. She felt her own cells answering the call. The dormant jugger nanos in her body. Suddenly activating. Her tattoo pulsated, her teeth ached, her head hurt. She shook it, closed her eyes, opened them again, almost bit her tongue. That bastard. That bastard was aiming at her weak spot, at the weak spot of every executioner. She fought the pain, raised her gun again, let it fall, raised it one more time. Yet, it fell down, to the ground, slipped from her fingers. Her sight became blurry. Only the jugger in her field of vision. Only it. And Galland? Where was Galland? She couldn’t see him. She couldn’t track him. Another shriek. Her headache stronger, her tattoo reacting even more. She groaned, pressed her boots on the floor. She could do it. She had to do it. It was nothing. It was…

  A sudden bang.

  Another bang.

  Another one.

  Rapid fire, two uzis singing in unison, in a melody of raining lead.

  Silence fell, the harrowing noise interrupted for an instant.

  Rondeau grabbed Slaughterhouse Dog, gulped, turned around.

  “…what?”

  Just to see an executioner with a large hat and dreadlocks and a fox with a long braid, dancing around her mastress while holding a gun. Ragtime. Paprika. Both armed and ready, both aiming at the jugger, pelting it with bullets, spraying death on its frame. The Verhoven creature stumbled back, waved its tail around. Rondeau’s head suddenly felt lighter. The pain gone. The jolts vanished. Her sight turned normal, her tattoo stopped pulsating. She didn’t lose an instant, shouted at the two newcomers.

  “What are you doing here?! What about the unhatched soldiers?! You shouldn’t…”

  “Bigger fish to fry. Like, you know, saving your sorry ass?”

  Ragtime’s voice broke out like a sound of thunder. Their weapon shot again, riddling the jugger’s body with even more holes, making blood flow wild out of it. Red pools started to accumulate at its feet, as more and more of that viscous fluid oozed through the wounds.

  “Your fox is keeping the soldiers at bay—and he’s damn good at it. Never seen someone choke hold a man twice his size just with his thighs like that. You should have seen him in action. So, we figured we’d get back to help, Ronron.”

  “And, as a matter of fact, my dear mastress Ragtime thought that they and I shooting juggers together would be a strong bonding exercise, before our honeymoon! Aaaah, I can barely wait, I am indeed so looking forward to it!”

  Right as Paprika said that, her uzi roared too, ripping through the joint of one of the left legs of the creature. Rondeau looked at the couple for a long second, as her brain chugged on one word that escaped the refined fox’s lips, as her sight focused on the shining ring said fox was carrying on her finger.

  “…honeymoon?”

  Ragtime tipped their hat, snapped their fingers.

  “Later, alligator. Now, ain’t anybody missing? Anybody suspicious, I mean?”

  Rondeau turned again towards the Verhoven jugger. True, there was a detail that was misplaced. A vital one. Something that didn’t register, immediately after Verhoven turned. After those first two shots. That was what deleted the information from her sight. Those first, opening shots that came from that silver pistol. Where was the man who shot it? Where did he go?

  And why was the door to the cargo carriage open?

  “Rot in hades!”

  Rondeau crunched her fist, almost spat on the floor. She started to run forward, under cover fire from Ragtime and Paprika, slid close to the jugger without stopping, without even breathing.

  Then, she jumped into the open door to the cargo bay.

  Ready to shoot down the mind behind that disaster.

  No matter his reasons.

  No matter his excuses.

  Slaughterhouse Dog was thirsty for blood.

  And blood would pour, one way or another.

  [chapter:Cartridge 09: Broken Masquerade]

  [i:Your self is mutable like wind in the night]

  The sound of an unlocked safety echoed in the emptiness of the last carriage. Galland didn’t even have to turn around to understand who the unexpected visitor was. He simply stood up, glancing at the carriage door, admiring the short silhouette of the woman carrying a shotgun—aiming it at him too. Galland raised his arms, surrounded by locked crates, many of them. Maybe one, two hundred pressurized containers, all with a face with three legs printed on them. The trinacria, the symbol of the Southern Mediterranean government. The country responsible for the jugger outbreak. Still, his guest didn’t seem fazed or interested in historical facts. She was simply staring at him, with her gun trained, probably already loaded. Galland snapped his metallic fingers, his artificial voice filtered through his face veil.

  “Good to see you here, Rondeau. I wasn’t expecting you to dispose of that juggernaut so quickly.”

  “I didn’t. Someone else is taking care of it for me.”

  “…impressive. I didn’t think there was something akin to cooperation among executioners.”

  “Executioners always have a plan B. Now…”

  Rondeau stepped forward, still pointing Slaughterhouse Dog at him.

  “…what are you doing here, Galland?”

  Galland squinted his eyes, without lowering his arms.

  “No shooting on sight? Giving me the benefit of the doubt? That’s considerate of you.”

  “You didn’t know about the real effects of the ‘vaccine’. Your rage, your angry reaction after finding out about it was… genuine. That was no act, Galland. I can’t connect all the dots... and this is why I haven’t pulled the trigger yet. But one thing at a time, shall we? What. Are you doing. Here?”

  Galland sighed, shrugged.

  “Making sure the cargo is fine and the sealed containers haven’t been breached or stolen by runaway juggernauts. If they had, we’d be in a serious biohazard situation.”

  “Except the cargo door was intact and closed, before you unlocked it.”

  “Juggers could have entered from the outside.”

  “On a train running at a hundred kilometers per hour?”

  “There are winged types that could have.”

  “In the Mediterranean Corridor?”

  “Someone had to check to be sure.”

  “Right during an anomalous jugger attack?”

  “One jugger against one thousand seeds potentially waking up. Doesn’t it make it worth it, Rondeau?”

  “Maybe.”

  Rondeau didn’t lower her weapon, her eyes were staring at his, in a still stand of gazes, inspecting each other in the dimly lit darkness of the container carriage. Her finger rested on the trigger, her breath moved her chest up and down in a regular pattern. Inhale. Exhale. Gunshots and curse words assaulted her senses from behind, from where Ragtime and Paprika were dealing with Verhoven. But that wasn’t the point, her point. She was there, facing Immanuel Galland. A man she couldn’t get a read on. A man that was most likely in Genuya, while the chaos unfolded, and yet wanted to talk with her about it. A man that seemed to like juggers but didn’t wait a second to shoot Verhoven after he turned. That man… that man was a mystery she couldn’t crack. All what he said was reasonable, from a certain point of view. She couldn’t deny the logic behind it. His reaction to Haressen’s assault was that of a man that wasn’t privy to it. His angry punch to the floor after the revelation of what the vaccine was about felt true.

  Still, there was something, a detail that didn’t check out.

  That was the key to everything.

  “Say, Galland, did you really detect jugger lumps in Verhoven, before he turned?”

  “…I did. My artificial hand sensed them when I almost strangled him, but at that time I wasn’t sure of it…”

  “The jugger that hatched from him is no ordinary juvenile. He must have been infected months ago.”

  Galland nodded.

  “Correct. Ordinarily, there is no way such an… abomination could sprout in one week or less.”

  “Then, answer me, Galland…”

  The barrels of Slaughterhouse Dog shone in the low light of the bulbs, a sinister glimmer travelled on the metal.

  “…why didn’t the sensors pick it up?”

  Galland didn’t reply. He kept his hands up, staring at Rondeau without saying a word. For the first time since that interrogation began, his words didn’t come out immediately after the question. So, Rondeau pushed forward, her finger still resting on the trigger.

  “Verhoven wasn’t vaccinated. Even if he was a lying piece of crud, there’s no way he tried to deceive us on that. And, as you said, he had jugger lumps. So, this excludes the serum altogether, right? But, if he was already infected when he boarded the train… how come we didn’t realize it? We have bloody sensors spread all over the main station, not including the portable ones Ragtime and I carry around! To hatch like that, he had to be terminal for the past two or three days at least! And, if he started spraying jugger chems as he should have, we would have detected him immediately. So, as weird as it sounds, there is only one explanation…”

  Her voice thundered, almost turning into a growl.

  “…he was infected on this train. Deliberately. Also, whatever infected him was supercharged enough to turn him terminal in less than eight hours and make him hatch in record time…”

  Her voice turned into a whisper, her fingers trembled around the trigger.

  “…much like the people in Genuya.”

  Galland looked at her, his azure eyes reflected in her brown mirrors. He snickered, a muffled laughter distorted by his face mask.

  “Well, what can I say, Rondeau? I’m bad at lying, I can’t seem to get it right. Alright, let’s suppose this… express method to hatch juggernauts existed. Why wouldn’t we see it more often, then? Such a powerful weapon would turn this world into a juggernaut heaven, wouldn’t it?”

  “Production issues. Missing raw components. Lots of possible reasons. Which means that you used up something very valuable to get rid of that idiot, Galland. Why didn’t you just shoot him dead with your gun, if you hated him so much? Heck, I was tempted to pull my trigger on him a couple of times too!”

  “Then, why didn’t you do it?”

  “Same reason as you, I guess—because I didn’t want to be jailed for killing an asshole.”

  Rondeau inhaled, took a deep breath. In the low lights of the carriage, the profile of Galland stood out, in front of hundreds of sealed cans. His cape was still, his muscles relaxed. Calm. Unnaturally calm. As if everything was inevitable. As if he had resigned himself to that outcome. But Rondeau couldn’t stop. She had to press more. She had to understand what his deal was. Thus, she spoke, once again, without waiting for him to interject first.

  “The juggerification of Verhoven… it was a distraction, right? So that you had time to sneak inside here unseen and do whatever you wanted to. You used Verhoven as a bait for executioners.”

  Another chuckled evaded Galland’s veil, louder than the first.

  “Rondeau, those are baseless assumptions. You have no proof, no evidence, no idea of what you are talking about. It would be so simple for me to just deny everything and court martial you for high treason…”

  He snapped his metallic fingers, lowered his arms.

  “…but that would only make you try harder to get me, causing unnecessary tension for what would be the same end result. So, here’s your prize, Rondeau: you are very close to the truth. Not quite right, but almost. Well done.”

  Rondeau stared at him for a long instant, squinted her eyes.

  “…what?”

  Galland shrugged again, shook his head.

  “I didn’t plan for the vaccine to backfire. I didn’t plan for the soldiers to turn. That… surprised me too. And it’s a shame, Rondeau. A true… shame. All I wanted to do was enter this carriage before Valletta and save the seeds. I thought it was impossible, without causing a commotion. If I knew that would happen without my intervention, I wouldn’t have wasted a seed on Verhoven. But, hey, I can’t rewind time. Infecting him during our first handshake after boarding the train was the best shot I had.”

  “Save… the seeds?”

  Rondeau lowered her shotgun, her eyes still locked with Galland’s in a neverending exchange of stares. Galland’s voice filtered again through his veil, even more distorted than usual.

  “Juggers are living creatures. They think. They feel. They are intelligent and have a sense of self. These one thousand unborn juggers were going to be used as weapons and then disposed of. How cruel can one be to do that?”

  “…you shot Verhoven right after his jugger emerged.”

  “Do you love all human beings equally just because they are human, Rondeau? Don’t you have grudges against some of them? Wish some people had never been born? Why should it be different for juggernauts?”

  That question pierced her. Galland’s words pierced her. Yet, he kept talking, without giving her a second to elaborate.

  “Do you think you can love your species unconditionally? Is there anyone that isn’t a god that managed to do that? Well, I can’t. Verhoven pissed me off. The jugger that spawned from him… he pissed me off too. Forcing the younglings to hatch before their time, just because he could.”

  “You used him!”

  “Exactly like he tried to use you! It’s no coincidence that we both are here, on the same train. Verhoven wanted us to meet to keep each other in check while he played his political games!”

  Galland pointed his finger at her, his voice became louder, a growl that overshadowed every other noise.

  “We are on the same side, Rondeau! Juggers, executioners… we’re all pawns on a chessboard! Ask yourself who’s the real villain! Do you think that vaccine failed alone? Why were the test results forged? There’s something bigger than us at play here…”

  His voice slowed down, turned into a whisper, almost to the point of vanishing.

  “I mean, do you really believe that Peach hatched because of you, Rondeau?”

  A loud bang, a blast that shook the carriage. The linoleum in front of Galland had been devastated by a shower of lead. Rondeau was breathing, breathing, breathing. She cocked in another cartridge, raised her weapon again. Her eyes were bloodshot, her grimace demonic, her tattoo was shining in the semidarkness of the storage room. Tears. Tears were flowing down her cheeks.

  “…don’t talk about him! You don’t know anything about him…”

  “Don’t I, now? What if he were…”

  “Shut up!”

  “Rondeau, it wasn’t your fault! And not his either! The serum that turned Verhoven—I stole it from...”

  “SHUT UP!”

  Her heart pounded in her chest like drums, at an impossible rhythm. She couldn’t stop it. She couldn’t slow it down. Pain. Sharp pain radiating all over her body. Memories filling her brain. That last night together. The moment his skin split. The moment he wailed. The moment he…

  Breathe. Breathe.

  Silence fell for a second. Silence dotted by the sharp noise of a shooting uzi, the sound of metal turned into sawdust by gunfire. A shriek reached her, a scream in a voice that reminded that of Verhoven. Rondeau shivered, turned around shortly. Her mouth fell agape, her teeth almost bit her lips. Those were words without meaning, sounds arranged in a random pattern. Jugger sounds. The same she always heard. The same he…

  “You can understand them, right, Rondeau? The juggers, I mean. Their pleas for help.”

  “…”

  “Then?”

  Rondeau turned around to face him. Her eyes were wet, still overwhelmed by tears. Her teeth gritted, her hands clenched around her weapon.

  “…does it make a difference?”

  Galland stood silent for an instant, looked at her.

  “Yes, it does. But you pretend you don’t. And you don’t tell it to anyone that you can.”

  “Nobody of us does. If we did…”

  “…all of you would go insane, right?”

  A long breath, a long sigh. Rondeau’s hand steadied around the grip.

  “Who are you, Galland? Who are you really?”

  “…does it make a difference?”

  Rondeau snickered, wiped away her tears. A shadow of her former self came back, triumphantly took the place of her vulnerable side.

  “No, it doesn’t. You’ll become ashes anyway.”

  She browsed the left pocket of her jacket, pulled out a small spherical device with a rubbery skin. Galland’s eyes widened. He gasped, raised his arm, screamed. She grinned at him, as her fingertip pushed the hidden button.

  “I told you, didn’t I? Executioners always have a plan B!”

  [chapter:Cartridge 10: Fireworks Galore]

  [i:Grenades are a gal’s best friend]

  The siren on the Verhoven jugger recoiled, pierced by another salvo of bullets. An uzi on the right side. One on the left. Synchronized fire, hitting from all angles at once. Another clip thrown away, another replaced. The strip of fabric stretched to its maximum size, short before snapping. Only irregular sounds came out of the jugger’s head, the damage too extended to even try to emit coherent noise all the time. Still, it was enough to keep Ragtime occupied, to make them feel sharp jolts of pain, hinder their movements too. So, it waved its tail to hit them, trying to slam it in its assailants, piercing the carriage floor, the ceiling, the walls, with precise strikes. Two windows shattered, glass shards rained inside outside the train. Ragtime grabbed Paprika’s hand, let the fox twist and turn around them, in a delicate dance. Paprika kissed their nose from behind their face mask, licked it shortly, before turning towards the jugger and shooting again. There were scratches on her skin, one of the buckles of her dress was broken and hanging, leaving her left side naked and exposed. Still, she kept dancing, waving her tail around her body as an extensions of that elegant sequence of movements. Ragtime’s uniform had been damage too, slashed in several spots. Blood poured from some of the wounds, but not in a way that worried them. Fighting in a tight carriage was hard. The seats were in the way and made it hard to dodge. Now, though, the Verhoven jugger had cleared a wide area from them, ripping them off and throwing them around like rag dolls. That was the opening they needed. The more Verhoven destroyed that carriage, the easier it was to maneuver around its massive body. Paprika bit Ragtime’s ear, before switching the clip of her uzi.

  “My, my. Our dear guest seems exceptionally sturdy.”

  “It’s okay, Rikarika. We almost broke its loudspeaker. We just need a little more punch.”

  “And more punch you’ll have, mastress dearest!”

  The tail spear downed again on them from above, causing them to scramble, roll on the same side, driven by the ribbon that joined their weapons. Paprika’s hand touched the floor, a pile of items that rested on it. Including the rope that tied Haressen. Her specially crafted rope, with all those tiny knots, arranged precisely to stimulate every little bit of her body. Such a waste that it was now left around without having been used for its real purpose. Still, Paprika smirked. That was all she needed in that moment. She quickly grabbed it, unrolled it, threw one end of it to Ragtime. Ragtime nodded, grabbed it in their hands. They left the uzis on the ground, started running in opposite direction. The rope unrolled further, following their joint motion, until they were around two meters apart. Then, they exchanged a wink, leapt forward together. The rope hit the ‘neck’ of the jugger, spun around it. Paprika ran left. Ragtime ran right. The knot closed around the ‘throat’ of Verhoven, right under the blossomed siren. One round. Two rounds. Then, they both stopped running and started pulling. One from each side, fastening the knot with all their strength.

  A loud crack, followed by a metallic thud.

  The siren head snapped broken.

  Blood sprouted from it, in a red fountain that covered the juggernaut’s body, all while its remaining five legs scrambled to achieve some measure of balance. Its light patterns went wild, flashing and blinking without rhyme or reason. Paprika reached for her uzi again. Ragtime did the same. The two weapons reloaded, aimed at the towering, staggering shape. They put them close to each other, their barrels almost kissing. Paprika rubbed her cheek against Ragtime’s, winked at them.

  “May I have the pleasure?”

  “Only this time, Rikarika.”

  “Or shall we… do it together?”

  Ragtime patted her head, straightened their aim.

  “Alright. Three, two, one…”

  Their voices blared in unison, a perfect synchronicity.

  “Rot in hades, motherfucker!”

  Before pulling the triggers at the same time.

  And riddling the main core of the wounded jugger with lead.

  Till the plates broke open. Till the flesh was exposed.

  Till its organs were shredded by continuous fire, turned into fine pulp.

  The Verhoven jugger stumbled, shrieked from all of its broken speakers. The lights faded, one by one. And, in the end, it fell motionless, crumbling on its side.

  A pool of blood spread under its body, oozing in all directions, while the main structure broke down, while the legs stopped moving. Its mind too stopped working. Its thoughts. Its prayers. Whatever the messages it sent were. Silence. They turned into silence. Ragtime could almost feel pity for it. Almost. Its pleas. Its requests for help. That’s what they thought they’d hear. Usually, that was all what the freshly hatched juggers did. Ask for help. Show confusion. But no, Verhoven was cursing against them. Whatever jugger spawned from inside him, had learned to cuss and threaten instead of lamenting its fate. That, of course, made Ragtime’s life easier. Pulling the trigger on an asshole was way more satisfying than doing it on a screaming piece of metal that still retained traces of their humanity. So, as the massive jugger expired, they felt relieved. Relieved that this time it wasn’t that hard to feel innocent, even after slaughtering what once was a man.

  That’s when the pineapple went off.

  The shockwave shook the floor, caused Paprika to stumble, to fall on Ragtime, pinning them to the floor, making them lose their grip on the uzi.

  Black smoke blasted from the cargo carriage.

  And, between the charred clouds.

  Rondeau.

  Rolling on the ground, with her uniform slashed and burned, her hands still holding her shotgun. Another explosion. Another. Another one again. Suddenly, it dawned on Ragtime. The pressurized containers that hosted the jugger seeds. Were popping off like balloons. As a result of the grenade’s explosion. A chain reaction that caused an unending series of detonations. Then another. Then, another one again.

  Rondeau stood back on her feet, stumbled forward, stood up again. She raised her fist, her thumb up, while keeping her grip on her weapon, while Ragtime was almost shouting at her.

  “A bloody pineapple? Really? Gal, we ain’t a demolition troupe!”

  “Screw that, Rags! That was the only way!”

  In that moment, Rondeau’s shoulder twisted. A loud bang, a silver trail in the air, all while another container exploded. Rondeau’s sleeve was ripped open, her skin grazed, bleeding underneath. Another shot. Her right thigh too, on the outside. From the smoking container, a silhouette emerged, keeping a gun in their artificial hand. His cape was ripped, his uniform open, showing an impressively fit body, marred by metal inserts, by patches, by stitches. The veil, though, was still covering his face, as his black hair flew over his ripped clothes, as his icy eyes landed on Rondeau.

  “…what a plan B, Rondeau. I hope you’ll manage to sleep well, this night, knowing you just killed… you just murdered one thousand unborn living creatures!”

  Another blast behind him. Black smoke emerged from the door, as more and more containers popped open, incinerating their content. Rondeau gritted her teeth, raised her weapon. Only for another shot, this time grazing her right hand. She howled, spat on the floor, without averting her gaze from that silhouette, the body of the man… of the person known as Immanuel Galland. Another explosion behind him. Then, another one. There was was no hate, no anger in his eyes. Only sadness. Disappointment, maybe.

  “…I would have done the same, in your place. I don’t have the right to judge you. My hands are caked with blood.”

  “Galland! Stop it! It’s over now!”

  Another explosion. Another container gone. Galland lowered his gun, turned around. Then, he jumped back into the cargo container, as more and more explosions went off, as more and more capsules broke down, destroying their precious content. Rondeau tried to step up, tried to stand again. Yet, the wounds were too deep. The pain too much to handle. So, she groaned, her only healthy hand went for her jacket, pulled out a second pineapple, a third one too. It was her whole remaining stock of bombs. Two of them. It was stupid. It was the worst decision she could ever make. Still, it was what it meant to be an executioner—make the decision nobody else would. So, she gritted her teeth, pushed the buttons. And threw both grenades inside the cargo carriage.

  The surviving windows shattered. A symphony of explosions went off, echoing all around the train. More black smoke emerged from it, vanishing through the breached walls, burning through the plastic, the metal, the fabric, the wood. Fireworks. A concerto of fireworks that devastated the carriage, burning everything inside it to ashes, turning hundreds of jugger seeds containers into molten paste. Suddenly, silence fell. Not one explosion more. Not one voice. Not one sound. The last firework had been shot. Now, all what was left was a charred carriage, full of molten metal, guarded by the corpse of a jugger that was once a politician. Galland too had to be there. As a charred body, maybe. Burned to a crisp by the second explosion. How was his face, under that veil? Did he have time to say his prayers? Did he have time to ask for forgiveness? What was his involvement in Genuya? What did he say about Peach? How could he… know? Too many. So many questions. Rondeau couldn’t keep her eyes open. Now that the adrenaline was gone, the wounds, the heat, the stress, the smoke, were making her head spin. And, as such, she closed her eyes, letting the screams of Ragtime and Paprika lull her to unconsciousness.

  [chapter:Cartridge 11: Breaking the Oath]

  [i:There’s worse ways to wake up than in the arms of a fox]

  This time it wasn’t a dream, it wasn’t a nightmare either. It was just how things were. Apple, her Apple, was licking her body from top to bottom, wiping away the blood, mending her wounds. Her naked skin pressed against his, as their lips locked more than once, as her hands explored his pecs and abs in a frenzy, in an absolute state of bliss.

  “Do you really believe that Peach hatched because of you, Rondeau?”

  Galland. That question broke her. That was right. She took all the responsibility for that. She took all the flak. It had to be her fault. There was no other way. But that line, the events that preceded it, changed everything. Verhoven hatched under her eyes, in an impossible way. As impossible as Peach’s death was. So maybe, just maybe…

  She let a moan escape her control, as Apple’s tongue made short work of the slash on her belly, moving lower and lower between her legs. His shock had been priceless. His completely serious expression broken by the weirdest pick up line ever.

  “About that… huh, ‘eating my cherry’ thing? Would you still… be fine with it?”

  “Who are you and what have you done to Rondeau?”

  “Just… hold me tight, please. And… and don’t spare any effort.”

  “…what with that ‘over my cold dead body’?”

  “Oh, shut up.”

  In that moment, Rondeau had simply launched herself on him, almost on the verge of tears, squeezing him like a pillow. Crying like a baby. Basking in his warmth. In a warmth so similar to that of Peach, yet so different. The taste of Apple’s skin wasn’t the same. Neither was his scent. Still, letting him have his way with her was all that mattered to Rondeau, all what her soul needed. Her handcuff jingled, right as she let her arms rest on the mattress.

  “Do you really believe that Peach hatched because of you, Rondeau?”

  Yes, she did. She still did. But maybe, just maybe, enjoying her time with Apple, letting their bodies tangle to their hearts’ content, was inevitable. In a world were there existed a serum that could turn a man into a jugger in less than a day, something able to turn a fox too, then no amount of caution could save them. No amount of keeping her distance. No amount of abstinence. It was fated to happen, sooner or later. So, that broke her wall, that broke her mind. Live now, regret it later.

  Before it’s too late.

  Before they both turned.

  Another soft moan reached Apple’s ears. His tail twitched, a wide smirk opened on his face while he delved deeper and deeper down the path. He rubbed his forehead on Rondeau’s navel, rubbed his cheek on it too, licked the last remaining blood out of it, cleaning the wound as well as he could. He didn’t need to ask. He didn’t need to have answers. For Apple, it was enough to know that Rondeau trusted him with her life. Everything else was window dressing. So, he went on, giving his best, rejoicing every time her body arced, every time her cheeks got redder, every time her hands squeezed him tighter. No matter the fact that they were doing it on a squeaky cot inside a destroyed train. No matter the fact that the train was stranded just out of the Valletta main station. No matter the fact that the police and army of both countries involved were going through every carriage to salvage whatever was still salvageable and find out what happened. Sooner or later, they would have broken into their cabin too, surprise them in the act of loving each other. That, though, was also completely inconsequential. Be it the Grand Cross of the Order, the Prime Minister in person, a highly-decorated general or even Paprika and Ragtime with a camera, nothing would change. Apple and Rondeau were going to enjoy their first night together to the far end, until dawn broke or even farther. They had one year worth of wait to get back. Nothing would have stopped them, short of the sky falling and the apocalypse incinerating them to hades. So, he savored the moment, savored her newborn confidence, savored everything about her, turning up the heat, stimulating her as he only could dream of.

  “You gotta get tested tomorrow, alright? And… and every day after! By a good doctor! A very good one! Not one of those who worked on that—that vaccine, alright?”

  That was her only condition. Piece of cake. He didn’t even think it twice, before accepting it and pouring all of his energies in giving her the best time of her life. On her side, Rondeau didn’t know what to think. She let him have his way with her, let him drive and lead, anxiously reaping the fruits of his labor.

  “Do you really believe that Peach hatched because of you, Rondeau?”

  Galland’s voice kept creeping inside her brain, somehow making her even more convinced about that resolution, about breaking that self-made oath that drove her determination for the past year. A senseless oath, one that everybody said was wrong, even Dr. Pluto. There was nothing strange with her body. Apple was immune too. But so was Peach. That blocked her. That uncertainty made her shrivel, become a shadow of what she was supposed to be. The sight of Verhoven changed that. The words of Galland changed that. And she wasn’t letting her rational mind take over, not for the rest of that night. Her body jolted one more time, while Apple gave his best. In that time, the pictures from the previous day, the pictures of the smoke, of the hatching soldiers, of Paprika and Ragtime dancing and kissing, came and went, in a blurry slideshow that turned into a series of indistinct images, letting only one word survive.

  ‘Honeymoon’.

  It had to be like that.

  Paprika and Ragtime had secretly got married. The ring on Paprika’s finger, their tender exchanges. Was it really like that or just wishful thinking, the effect of an overstimulated mind? A fox and an executioner… married? That was beyond science fiction. Another jolt of pleasure broke her mental movie, turned her on even more. She hugged Apple tighter, kissing his forehead, brushing his hair. The night was still long.

  And they wouldn’t waste any second of it.

  Not when they had so much lost time to recoup.

  **

  “What a mess.”

  “Sure is.”

  The woman tipped her cap, growled something under her breath. In the distance, sirens blared, lights flared in a concerto of chaos. It had to be a hard night in Valletta, according to the what she heard at the radio. But she didn’t care. She wasn’t paid to care—just to transport wares through the desert with her van. Someone called her ‘smuggler’, but that was a tall world. ‘Mover of untaxed property through alternative customs’ was a much more elegant way to put it. Still, a little bit of company couldn’t hurt, especially if said company was a beautiful hunk that just happened to walk shirtless through the wastelands. Sure, his face was funny, he had an artificial arm and his body was full of wounds, but having that weirdo around was still better than driving the rest of her trip alone. The man, though, didn’t seem too happy to share his story, except in short bursts of sentences. So, she had to ask, to make the trip more lively.

  “You look like someone who jumped out of a running truck.”

  “A train, almost the same thing.”

  “Wait, dude, for real?”

  A nod had been the only answer she got, together with a side eye. She took that chance to get a good look at him. As she had already observed, his face was strange—really strange. Under his eyes it looked mechanical, much like two rows of metallic shark teeth encased in a solid frame. Whatever that mask was, it didn’t detract from the general good look of that stranger, with that flowing black hair and those eyes that would make everyone melt. Another peculiar thing was that he kept a suitcase of sorts with him. Charred. Battered. Covered in ashes. Still, he didn’t let go of it, not even for a second. He kept it on his legs, opening it and closing it, checking its content with an almost dogmatic regularity. The driver had a look at it, while steering through the desert. There wasn’t much inside, just four small candy-sized orbs. Maybe they were really candies, but why keep them in a suitcase that big? One of them looked deformed, broken even. The man had caressed it several times, with a softness she didn’t think possible for him. So, she made two and two. Drugs. Those were some expensive, exotic drugs.

  “What’s yer deal with ‘em? Got some hot stuff in there?”

  “Maybe.”

  She pointed her finger at the broken capsule, the one that looked unsalvageable.

  “Is it better than sugar cane? Does it send you on a trip?”

  The man looked back at her, squinted his eyes.

  “Would you like to try it, by any chance?”

  “Oh, hell yeah! Just lemme drive this old van to the next parkin’ spot and sure as heck I wanna give it a go! That’s one hell of a payment for a ride, innit?”

  “Yeah. So…”

  His azure eyes shone in the low lights of the truck, curious, hopeful.

  “…after you wake up, be it in one month or one year, please, remember this. Remember me. Come and find me. I’ll protect you.”

  He snapped his finger in a specific pattern, several times, close to the broken capsule. The woman listened to it without understanding. Sounded like a sequence of numbers. Maybe a pager? Something else? She didn’t care, though. A trip was a trip, no matter how weird the dealer was. After trying sugar cane, devil’s dandruff and love juice, she couldn’t be scared by some new synth stuff.

  “Does it kick in immediately?”

  “…no, not immediately. It’ll take some time. Hours even”

  “Good.”

  The driver grabbed the small, deformed orb from the suitcase, put it in her mouth, swallowed it with a grin.

  “Then, let’s get this party started.”

  The man’s artificial mouth rearranged in a strange shape, one that could have been mistaken for a smile. He pulled down the window, closed the small metallic suitcase, caressed it once more. In the distance, he could see the first beams of the sun breaking through. A new dawn was going to grace the world after the darkest night. He looked at the sun, with something akin to relief in his chest.

  His story was not over yet.

  That was just the beginning of a new journey.

  [chapter:Interlude: Familiar Strangers]

  [i:Eyes can’t see what the brain hides for gain and profit]

  “Hello, welcome to the Roboner Paradise. How can I help you?”

  Ricardo didn’t even look at the customer that just got in, he simply recited his words automatically, without any sort of passion or care. Same line for every person stumbling in, who, most of the time, was either an Order nut or a beggar. At least, Order nuts had the habit of bringing money with them—lotsa money. It was simple, really. Executioners and their foxes were a merry bunch. Hotels had dedicated rooms for fox-on-executioner-action, which needed to be thoroughly sanitized after the act or only used by other Order members. There was a catch, though: getting a fox bedmate was a limited privilege. Thus, there were way too many lower level executioners without a state-assigned partner. All those poor sods could do to officially relieve their cravings was to get a robot to do them. Well, there were other alternatives, but all of them were just a little frowned upon—potential biohazard and uncontrolled infections notwithstanding. That meant a continuous, profitable influx of customers and a lot of public money, way more than he thought he’d ever see in one life. His uncle made the right decision, when he decided to pivot to that activity.

  Still, running a robrothel wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows. It was a high cost, high maintenance business, which justified cutting corners wherever one could (including on jugger sensors, but that was probably not something Ricardo could say out loud). To make matters worse, cleaning up after a robot did its job and an executioner got their fare share of climaxing was also a horrible mess. The cleaners had to wear one of those annoying hazmat suits just to enter the room, handle a couple of stained bedsheets, and throw them into the incinerator—not to mention spraying the robot with sterilizing gel and jugger-nano-killer agent. It was a bloody shit job, one he was happy to have a maid for. Except his maid had been jugger’d one month earlier and his uncle hadn’t found a replacement yet. That translated into ‘double the work for the same salary’. Ricardo was annoyed to no end, but—hey—at least they got a new six-hander for Executioner Rondeau. Which meant that the abs… no, the fox (what a slip) would walk in again with her, at some point. Ricardo had already paged that absolute disaster of a woman, filled with an unshakable trepidation for the next time the pecs… no, the fox (another slip, nothing serious), would stand in the same room as him. The answer had been kind of affirmative, so it was just a question of time. How much, though, he couldn’t say. So, he returned to his duties and turned to face the ‘customer’, betting in his mind on whether they were an executioner or a beggar (or both). His groan became audible from city blocks away as the answer became clear.

  In front of him stood a young woman dressed in rags, scraps of clothes without any coordination or style, covering the bare minimum to avoid being arrested for public indecency and almost failing at it. Still, something was amiss. First off, her skin. It was too smooth, too well taken care of to be that of someone living on the streets. Secondly, her skin (again), but for different reasons. There were metal plates covering parts of it. Her ankles. Her kneecaps. Her hips. The sides of her chest, right under her breasts. Both of her cheeks were embraced by metal too, and her whole neck was enveloped by black-ish shining rings. That was, if anything, a weird fit. It might have been one of those new fashion trends that died as fast as they sprouted, but even that felt contrived. Still, that wasn’t even the worst part. Her arms. Her arms were completely mechanical. They looked almost the same as those of a six-hander, down to the elongated shape of the fingers. Ricardo squinted his eye, trying to make sense of what he was glancing at. A beggar, dressed in nothing but a ripped poncho, sporting expensive mechanical prosthetics and strange metallic fashion accessories? That felt like a contrast, a contradiction that didn’t make sense. He stared deeply at that face, at those irises that were almost white, white as her hair too, as her skin. Albino, without a doubt. She couldn’t have been older than twenty, but also not much younger.

  The mysterious woman was staring at him without saying anything, resting her arms on the counter, tilting her head slightly on her left. Her face was traversed by something akin to curiosity, as if everything around her was new or unusual. Ricardo tapped his finger on the wood, grinned. Maybe, it was all because of his eyepatch. Some people got nervous around it. Or, maybe, that woman was just hoping to get some services for free and had never been to a brothel. Either way, making things clear had absolute priority.

  “…M’lady, beggars ain’t welcome her and I’m afraid we ain’t looking for new girls. This brothel employs only robots. So, please, go back the way you came in and leave me alone, yes? That is, unless you’re her to make use of our services. In that case, you are welcome to spend your money here.”

  The stranger kept looking at him, tilted her head on the other side.

  “Where girl?”

  “Huh?”

  “Short girl! Brown skin, spiky hair, mole on left butt cheek! Where girl?”

  Her voice sounded young, pretty energetic too, but her accent was a mess, missing articles and mangled grammar notwithstanding. She not only was a beggar, she was even a foreigner. Ricardo tapped his finger faster. He was now officially reaching the top echelons of absolute confusion, with no way for his neurons to connect any dots.

  “Girl here, thirty-four light-dark cycles past! Big gun too! Big big gun!”

  That woman looked more and more excited, gesturing wildly to mimic the shape of… something. Ricardo’s mind started to churn. That description, that very generic yet wildly vivid description, met, in fact, the profile of one person he knew (bar the mole on the butt cheek, which he hadn’t evidence of). That person had indeed been there that past month and was going to be there soon again.

  “…you are not looking for Rondeau, I hope…”

  Rondeau.

  Ron-deau.

  Ron-doh-uh.

  The woman vocalized that name twice, three times, almost singing it, almost as if she loved the sound of her own voice saying that. Her eyes shone, her smile beamed.

  “Rondeau! Yes, Rondeau! Where Rondeau? Mia wants meet Rondeau!”

  “Mia?”

  She pointed her mechanical index at herself, giggling, smiling at Ricardo.

  “Mia! Mia! Me, Mia!”

  “Listen up, Miss, huh, Mia, that idiot will come here at some point, but not now. Do you know her?”

  “Mia knows her! Mia met Rondeau here!”

  Ricardo squinted his eye, rubbed his chin. Whatever or whoever this Mia was, she sounded like an asylum inmate. One more problem Ricardo didn’t absolutely want to deal with, on top of his already complicated routine. So, his mind raced, putting together possible action plans. In a few instants, his brain came out with four options to get rid of her, four ways to preserve its own sanity.

  Option one: call the Order guys outside and have her evicted from the premise. That had the drawback of the blue-uniformed morons potentially finding out that he didn’t replace the jugger sensors yet. Ergo, massive fine and a lot of paperwork. So, that was off the table.

  Option two: ignore her and risk being harassed by her stupid questions for longer, till he lost his mind or had to resort to another option.

  Option three: give her Rondeau’s pager number and let them sort it out without his involvement, potentially risking the executioner’s retaliation in return.

  Option four: exploit that naive foreigner with the vague promise of letting her meet Rondeau, while making her work for breadcrumbs and no salary as a replacement maid in the brothel.

  Option four was, of course, the foulest, one that would have probably knocked him down three or four rungs on the holy ladder to heaven. Still, it felt right, somehow. Alluring, even.

  Ricardo grinned.

  Being an atheist had its advantages, after all.