Well, at least there wasn't a crunching noise. The dull meaty THWACK didn't sound or feel good, but crunching would have been worse. Though the chained wrists (As Ash was now chained to a wall) made taking the fist harder, moreso that it was coated in flint.
"...Never start with the head. The victim gets all fuzzy. He can't feel the next..." WHY THE HELL ARE YOU QUOTING THAT YOU MORON DID SHE ALREADY GIVE YOU BRAIN DAMAGE.
"Shut the fuck up."
The brunette woman was clearly in no mood to take any shit. If the first punch didn't clue Ash in on that, then the second one would. That one bounced his head off the wall.
"...so is'this what basses for entertainment nyo?"
Another thump, this time to the gut, forced an "Oof!" as the wind was knocked out of him.
"I said shut up!" snapped the woman, glaring daggers. "Or do you want me to go for your fucking jaw next?"
Ash actually did not reply, mainly because he needed to regain his breath. Instead, he just stared with bleary eyes. The woman was small, compact. She clearly needed her rock fists to do any serious damage: even if she'd had some training in boxing, she lacked the proper body type to really punch with any power. She'd be better off learning a defensive martial art, like aikido, though aikodo wouldn't let you beat someone up when they were chained to a wall. Why was she doing it? Had Ivan gotten bored and delegated? Or maybe he thought he was being clever based on certain things...
She snorted. "Thank Chakravartin, I thought I was going to go mad. Now, where was I...?"
She paced back and forth, eying the body on front of her. Ash might have appreciated it, had he not known she was simply scanning for a fresh place to hit. Then again, given his current condition, he might not have appreciated any of it at all.
"Hmmm. Maybe the liver next. The boss always aims for that..."
"Is your boss' boss pissed I told him the truth or...?"
PUNCH.
"Nooopppeeee...guess nottttt..." Ash said, sucking air between his teeth.
"I said," snarled the woman, "shut the fuck up! Can't you take a Mantra-damned hint in your life, or are you literally retarded?!
"...heh, wouldn't surprise me, actually." To Ash's immense relief, she stood back and away from him, out of punching distance, to admire her handiwork. "You'd have to have the IQ of a cowpat to try and fight us. That, or a death wish the size of a small planet."
"We have found something."
Another time. No chains, no punches, instead just a seat at a table, but perhaps worse in a way. Ash hadn't liked the look in Godfather's eye the second he'd seen it.
"There are mines in the chasm we came out in. Useless minerals, or so we thought...then one of our less...intelligent members became grossly intoxicated and decided to...nasally inhale some of them once they were crushed, on a dare. The results were...surprising."
"Are they still alive?"
"They have some injuries from when their wood control accidentally caused the building they were in to collapse when they accidentally pulled it out of the ground with a thought. An object-moving process sixteen times outside their previously assessed maximum weight limit."
"...purple and blue crystals? Almost wet to the touch, found in dark crumbly clay?"
"Yes."
"...It's best used...crushed and mixed with salt...and then mixed with distilled water...and injected right into the bone marrow."
"...and why should we believe any of this?" If you quirked Godfather's eyebrow any higher here, it would fly off her face. "After all the effort I wasted in getting you to talk, suddenly you're just giving this information to us?"
"Because that's not some random magic crystal. That's the basis for Wunderwuffe you just stumbled over. And the only way you can safely use Wunderwaffe is if it's purified. Like wine, that takes years, and no Blackbird in my world is going to trade that information or service with invaders. And I know you're going to insist on taking it, because like you said. It made your stupid experimenting minion several times stronger. Has he or she started manifesting psychotic tendencies yet? Because that's sort of what happens when you ingest a high grade combat steroid equivalent."
"Kou?" Godfather laughed, and waved a hand dismissively. "Oh, whatever~! It's nice to see him be more assertive for once, instead of being a limp-worsted dork! Also, the way he threw his lab assistant through a window was funny as scheiße!"
Then her demeanor changed, as thoughts began to creep along her brain like a centipede on the prowl.
"...if it works for him, surely... Yes, I don't see why not...
"Is there any way," she asks, no longer muttering, "to speed that process up? I haven't got years to work with, you know! I'm a busy woman!"
"Please don't use it. I am asking you not just for my world's sake, but your world and your people."
In response, the Don of the Magpies cupped a hand to her ear.
"What's that? I can't hear you over the sound of money not being made! It sounds like a little blond-haired boy whining that the other kids are playing with his toys!"
"...I'm being quite serious." Ash said. "Wunderwaffe takes years to adapt to. It provokes excessive aggression, it destroys rational thought...I don't even know what it will DO to people like you. It might be poisonous. Do you want to play Marie Curie?"
"I don't know who that is."
"Do you want to hop up your people on drugs and then find them killing each other or keeling over dead of heart attacks?"
For a moment, Ash thought he saw something change in Godfather. In her eyes, the hazy cloud of self-obsessed, childish glee seemed to give way to what semblance of rational thought must have continued to drive her on the path of madness and law-breaking. She seemed to seriously ponder his words for a moment, not just casually dismiss them as though they were somebody else's problems. And, for a moment, it flared a spark of hope.
He might be getting through to her...
Then the raven-haired woman turned to an aide standing in a corner.
"Clerk," she snapped, "take a note, send it via InfoTube to Kou and Saguaro's divisions. 'Side effects of new compound reported by captive to be dangerous. Devote 50% of resources to finding a counter-compound to alleviate them. Also, broken window coming out of paycheck.'"
The aide did as told, scribbling out her message on a sheet of note paper before dashing off somewhere. After a pause, the woman turned back to Ash, clapping her hands together, and the selfish child was back in all her glory.
"So! Anything else you want to share? Or are we done with the whole 'doom and gloom forecast' routine?"
"If you start using Wunderwuffe on your troops, you will cause panic."
"You're no fun. Ironsides!"
In the corner, the sound of metal grinding against itself announced Ivan's standing to attention. "Da, madam?"
"Take the useless jerk back to his cell. Oh, and Ivan?"
Godfather's eyes flashed dangerously. Shadows swirled about her feet.
"No more 'private interrogations'. Understood?"
A brief scrape told Ash Ivan had clearly flinched or stiffened at this. Huh. So the big lug was afraid of something, after all.
"...Ponyal."
"Ma'am?" Ash said, having gone quiet. "May I ask YOU a question?"
"Stellen entfernt." (Ask away)
"What did your people tell you about my capture?"
"...that my forces overwhelmed you, despite the fight you put up. Lost a lot of good men, though. Why, is this important?"
"Is it?"
"I don't know," cried Godfather in irritation. "I thought you'd tell me if it was!"
"...just take me back to my cell."
Ivan's massive paw clamped on Ash's shoulder and began to drag him from the room. As he crossed the threshold of the room, though, the blond got a good last look of the black-haired leader turning her back on him, muttering audibly under her breath.
"What a spinös, honestly..."
And oh look, Ivan had taken that moment to enter the room Ash was currently in. His most recent abuser was apparently a subordinate of some sort. Ash just looked dully at Ivan, who towered over his female aide.
"Ash Marsello, Exa-"
Punch.
"...You suck at your job. Both of you." Ash mumbled, before hacking a glob of blood on the floor.
"Says the man with a bruised liver and maybe internal bleeding," Countered the woman with a sneer.
"Great if you just want me to suffer...oh yes, your boss doesn't want me to suffer. QED."
THUMP. That was probably the ribcage that bent horribly, there.
"Godfather isn't my boss," spat his assailant. "Ivan is. You think I take a direct order from that cuckoo? That's like if that sick fuck Muerto told me to drag you over to his place and feed you to one of his pets! And Morpheus knows I'm not doing that!"
"And Ivan's boss...is Godfather." Ash said, like he was stating 'the sky is blue'. "Ivan at least...I get. Why are you so mad at me?"
The woman looked at him as though he'd grown three heads.
"...okay, from the top." She lifted one rock-coated hand, the stone grating as she counted on her fingers. "One. You never shut up. Two. You're a fucking smart-aleck, and normally that's all the excuse I need. And three," she finished, clenching a fist, "Ivan's been getting cranky with this idiotic botch-job of an operation, and if I don't do this then he's going to take it out on me. And it's your fault for being the motor-mouth wiseacre with the mental capacity of slug shit who put him in that mood to begin with."
Analysis complete, she folded her arms and awaited whatever response Ash could devise. She honestly looked as though she thought that was enough to silence him.
"...Just let me go."
It was rare for Ivan to look goggle-eyed. Ash couldn't speak for the woman.
"I have pull in my world. We'll sign a peace treaty. We'll give you lots of supplies and treasure. You can take your people back and this can end peacefully, and Ivan can get the credit for getting what you want without wasting manpower or resources."
Hannah opened her mouth to speak-
"No."
-and was shoved roughly aside by Mr. Silver, bouncing off a wall as she went. The metallic form of the Russian loomed over Ash, glaring visibly beneath the faceplate.
"Do you think, little bastard," growled Ivan, "that we are stupid enough as to fall for trick like that? We cannot simply let you go on your worthless word! Where is guarantee you will not simply run off and bring back army to crush us?"
"But on the other hand," Hannah suddenly snapped back, picking herself from the floor, "how do we know he'd even do that?! He already got his ass kicked hard enough to bruise - he can't be stupid enough to risk open warfare with us!"
By way of response, Ivan rounded on her, fists clenched and an angry snarl building. The smaller woman flinched, but otherwise remained upright.
"I gave you my word." Ash's voice was tense.
"Word of dead man is worth nothing," snapped Ivan, rounding back on Ash. "You attack us and decimate our forces! And you think we let you go on just your word?!"
"Oh, be fucking reasonable!" Hannah moved, as if to intercept whatever the bigger man had planned. "Maybe he means it! We can beat anything he's got, surely we can-"
CRUNCH.
When Ivan's elbow retracted, Hannah was doubled over and screaming into the hands over her face. Blood dribbled from around nose level between her fingers.
"Forgive my assistant," rumbled Mr. Silver, almost casually. "She is new, and does not understand Magpie code."
It was funny that Ivan mentioned a lack of understanding just then. There were a few things he did not grasp himself.
One was the fact that Ash's cells were prisons designed to block the powers of Ubers. The Magpies had discovered that they seemed to work on Stream users as well, to a degree. After all, Ash hadn't tried to break out, had he? So surely he couldn't.
Another was the fundamental difference on how accessing the energy of the Stream affected people from Ash's world per how superpowers worked on theirs. The downside of excessive Stream use was Immersion, a condition similar to radiation poisoning...but the upside before you got to that point was a gradual increase in a body's strength and endurance.
The third was how a human body worked. Specifically, how it operated under a certain set of limits to prevent damaging itself. Crisis situations disabled those limits, which is how you had mothers lifting cars to save their children, as went the classic example. The body could function at three to five times its maximum capacity, at the downside of the fact that doing so would actively damage the body, and sooner rather than later. Hence, it was incredibly difficult to consciously disable those limits, which is why one often needed an outside source. Like alcohol.
Or overwhelming rage.
The end result was that when Ivan, having innately turned his head to look at his handiwork (or elbowwork, technically), turned back, he found Ash had broken the chains off the wall.
He also found that instead of Ash's punch futilely breaking his fingers on Ivan's faceplate, the end result was more like someone had swung a mace full on into his face. Not normally a problem...if Ivan had been expecting it. He had NOT been expecting that, and hence even he was staggered.
Ash promptly got around him, grabbing him by the head, his hand finding a fair grip in the various shifting indentations of Ivan's armor, and began smashing Ivan's face into the also-metal wall. Hard. Hard enough to leave indentations. And with every slam, a snarling word.
"MEN-DON'T-TREAT-WOMEN-LIKE-THAT!!!!!"
Alas, snapping in rage could only do so much for Ash. It did not help him when Hannah Vallis (Codename: Rubble) instinctively panicked and slugged Ash in the back of the head with her rock-coated fist. Ash's offensive cut off like a switch, as he slumped and then finally collapsed, knocked cold.As said, not seeing punches coming made them count for a lot.
Slowly, Ivan staggered back upright, looking as though he'd just woken up from a bad dream. His eyes were wide behind his mask, wide with an almost childish fear, and for a moment he simply stood there, breathing in ragged, rapid gasps. The front of his mask was almost caved in, crumpled and fractured in multiple places.
A long pause.
"...you alright, boss?" Hannah eventually piped up. "You look like-"
"Dismissed."
Hannah blinked. "Wh-?"
"You are dismissed," rumbled Ivan, almost like his old self again, "until further notice. Clean up here, but leave at once afterwards." And whirling on his heel, the steel-clad criminal marched from the room, his footsteps heavy with barely-contained rage masking his brief vision of terror.
Hannah stared after him, hesitating.
Then she looked down at Ash's unconscious form.
-------
When Ash next awoke, he'd have found his meal of the day on the bedside table, back in his cell instead of the interrogation room. Accompanying it was a note.
"I'll bring it up with the Council. It'll be something for them to chew on, at least.
- H."
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