Neko-laus 2 : Toy Tiger

Separation


I didn’t think we would be given a hero’s welcome when we returned to the transport that took us back up to the ship hanging in space or maybe I should say, I wasn’t expecting a hero’s welcome and I was right. Mags ended up getting a commendation and his classic Empire features spread across the galaxy as the star of the Mage Division, defender of the realm. I got escorted directly to the brig with a side trip to the Medics. The poor kid assigned to work on stitching me back up shook more than I did and I ended up starting to suture myself together before two big burly nurses came in with a full fledged doctor bringing up the rear. I got shot with a tranq dart. It wasn’t until I fell over on my face that they moved in and stripped me bare.

Well, that was one way of making sure that I didn’t stab anyone.

I was fucked up worse that I thought I was. While I thought it was pretty damned callous and inventive, Mack went all crazy like a little dog trying to guard me until he got a dart too. I thought it was funny. I’d never really had anyone try to defend me before...well, no, that was a lie. Donnie threw himself over me when the bullets were flying.

Mack was left in the medical wing as I was placed on a gurney and whisked off toward the detention level. I didn’t lose consciousness but I was pretty well boneless. The nurses seemed to be about the size of Elway but then it could because I was laying flat. I was transferred to the bed. A sheet was tossed over me, clean clothes were set on a bedside table and then the lights were dimmed and the cell door was locked.

It was mana. It was bliss. It was bigger than a closet and toasty warm. I slept the way I was supposed to. I slept as nature took its course at healing. I had been down and out before landfall and with running around down on that planet killing people and blowing shit up, I was exhausted. I stirred briefly when Mags showed up and raised a ruckus that brought down the military police on him. If he thought he was going to get his ass tossed into the same cell he was sadly mistaken. He was given house arrest which meant he was confined to his quarters.

After that things got nice and peaceful.

I’m not being an ass but I was used to things moving at a slower pace. I felt like I had been running through mud up to my waist trying to keep up with King Tiger Arthur Magnus. If I was tagging along of my own free will it might not have been so tiresome but he was still dragging me after him. The brig is supposed to be a place of shame to a real soldier of the Empire. I was a volunteer – a convicted felon -- I could live here. Okay I had lied. Five days of this was enough. I mean come on. Yes, I had twenty demerit points but they were all valid protests. And, I did end up having to rip all of King Tiger’s power away just like I warned them.

All I saw were the security detail and the medical staff who could give treatment on the other side of the iron door. Well it wasn’t really iron. I mean this damned flying monstrosity is the state of the art if not the flagship of the Empire so of course it wouldn’t be something so crass as something non technological people could hammer out. The other thing is that the lock on this is manual. I took it to mean that someone had figured out that I can manipulate the energy in the walls and grid. A regular door on a regular cell and I would have been out of there in a heartbeat. If I had my kit, I could have picked the lock on this one. It’s a necessary skill of survival for the Shambles. Even the smallest of kids know how to jimmy locks. Without my latent ability and my lock picking kit, I just know that the damn cell door is strong. I’ve now got a broken toe.

There was a vid feed built into the far wall directly across from my cell door. Security liked watching some incomprehensible sport that involved running around kicking a round egg back and forth. I think they were trying to shove it in a net that was strung up over a box. I just knew that they couldn’t use their hands. The remote was kept at the security station so I was forced to endure. Once in a while there would be ship directives and news that overrode the system but then it was back to the kicking fools. The only thing I could do with it was turn it off or on. Changing channels would require magic and I just didn’t think being helpless in here was a good idea.

I know what I look like. Mags had disarmed the higher ups by calling me Neko and making me his bed buddy but my kill numbers disturbed everyone. I include myself in this. Killing is a personal thing. It should be. I have killed in the past and I know the faces of those I did. The report came back and thirty kills were accredited to me. I have vague recollections but only two instances – the man who forked me over and another man I ran past. Twenty-eight others, I have no clue. Kills were attributed to blades. A particular type of blade. My long daggers that I wore strapped across my back.

I don’t know what to think about that. My Mom’s words “it’s you or them” echo in my head but those men’s deaths are weighing on me. They were just defending their homes. This was the first time I was the invader and I didn’t like it. I wanted to speak with Mags. I didn’t need him to tell me that it was alright, or maybe I did. I was confused. I was confused and isolated. I was confused and isolated and lonely. Fuck. I actually missed my King Ass.

Day Five it became glaringly obvious that the only reason I was in the brig was to keep me away from Magnus. I mean even security was puzzled as to why I was still there. Usually little blow ups like I did were at a max a three day sentence. During that entire time, my tattoo never flared. I saw Mags on the vid screen every day on a victory tour or goodwill tour or look-at-what-we –got-and-we’ll-let-him-loose-on-your-ass-if-you-don’t-consent-to-every-single-one-of-our-demands. As the publicity tour went on, Mags was looking a little haggard.

I asked security once if someone was making sure that King Tiger was taking his meds. You think I dropped a grenade in their midst. There was a sudden shift change and I never did get an answer. It was late at night of the six night when I stirred awake because the tattoo on my chest began to tingle. It wasn’t an outright burn – let’s get it on now but it was enough to wake me from a deep sleep. I rolled over with my hand splayed on my chest and noticed golden hair standing at the cell door.

“Hey, I thought you live on planet whatever...” I rubbed at my eyes.

“So, you do have a preference for blondes.”

Huh? I blinked the man into focus. The color of the uniform, the height and the hair had thrown me off. Wait. I splayed a hand over my burning tattoo again. Well it wasn’t burning with the intensity that it normal took. “What the fuck are you doing? Who the hell are you?”

“Intelligent and vulgar, another couple of traits they said you had.”

“Lacking of patience is another one. Now, who the hell are you?”

The blonde turned around to face me directly. Aside from the physical stature, there really wasn’t anything close to resembling Mags. This guy was young. Younger than me. There was a long scar starting up in his hair line and it raked down over his brow and ended at his jaw line. From that wound alone he could have lost one eye. He turned his face towards the dim light of the security desk displaying the scar for me to see. There was a strange glint in his right eye as he did it. He did lose his eye. I frowned. But he was wearing Mage black. A Mage needs his vision to cast.

“How can you cast with a fake eye?”

He straightened up abruptly. “You’re not disgusted by my scar?”

“I’ve seen worse.” I’d given out worse.

“How did you know about my eye?”

I sat up and winced as the tattoo flared but then dimmed back down. Okay, I was naked but the blankets were pooled around my hips so nothing vital was showing. “Whatever you’re doing stop it. I know you’re not King Tiger.”

“Answer my question first.”

“It’s got a different shine in the light. Like metal gleaming.”

“You’re powers of observation are astounding. There are other Mages who still don’t know.”

I said nothing. It wouldn’t do me any good to give more away. I could learn from my past mistakes. The power on the tattoo faded and I breathed a sigh of relief. Taking care of business solo was fine but I had a taste of a little bit of Mage something, something and I wanted more of it.

“Allow me to introduce myself, I’m Grant Wendell, Tiger Mage, Eighth Rank.”

Rank? My puzzlement must have appeared on my face.

“Of course, you would only know King Tiger as King Tiger because Magnus is ranked as First. There are five active King Tiger Mage in the Empire. If you were another Mage’s Latent, it would be King Tiger, Fourth Rank.”

“Why the hell are you here bothering me in the middle of the night? Are you the reason I’m stuck in here?” A good defence is a fucking aggressive offense.

“Well doesn’t this get us straight to the point. Blunt and brutal it is, Nicholas. I’m here because the powers that be want me to break synchronicity between you and Magnus.”

What?

“You have too strong an influence over the most power Mage in our universe. You are a convicted felon. You are from a hotly contested military region. There is no telling what you would have Magnus do, so I am here to take you away from him.”
I stood up wrapping the sheet around my waist. I felt at a disadvantage laying on the bed. “You think you can do that.”

Wendell gestured down at himself. “I know what I look like. If I didn’t have this scar and replacement eye, I would be trotted out on the PR tours that Magnus is enduring right now. Again, the powers that be think that I would make a good substitute.”

“It’s fucking insulting.”

“Don’t I know it.”

“If you don’t like it, why are you going along with it?”

“Number one, I’m ordered to do so. Number two, I’m tired of being Eighth Rank. With you as my Latent, I just might make it up to First.”

“I don’t work that way.”

“Number three – planned obsolesce.”

I shook my head. I had no idea what Wendell was trying to say to me. “You, Nicholas, are in the way of, how can I say this, you are in the way of the Empire putting their strongest and most pretty Mage to best use.”

“I don’t get it.”

“Latents are like batteries, they get used up and thrown away. Mages are the same. Panzers have a possibility of surviving and returning to the private sector. In reality, they are just scouts looking to fill the ranks of the Mage division. Tigers become mage academy teachers. King Tigers...well, King Tigers are lost out in the battlefield.”

“No, that’ why Mags has to take his meds, so he doesn’t.”

“You aren’t listening Nicholas. There are no King Tigers who retire.”

“...but...”

“This is why Magnus has been so indulgence his entire military career. There is nothing for him afterwards, because there is no afterwards. He lost control out on the battlefield and a whole lot of men on both sides died that day. That was his death knell and he knows it.”

“He told me...” Mags called it a scorched earth policy but I knew what he meant. When a Mage finally combusted himself with his power.

“But you don’t understand, Nicholas. Magnus is not a benevolent Mage. Hell he has a reputation as a right nasty bastard if you cross him. The face he’s showing you now isn’t his true face. He went searching for the strongest latent in the Empire to keep himself from dying. He sync’d you in secret. He mage marked you with his own position. Your latency is the only thing keeping him alive. If we don’t break the sync, it doesn’t matter if you’re on the battlefield at his side or sitting in a detention cell thirty light years away, you’ll die.”

I looked at this Wendell through the bars of my cage. He wanted something. I could feel his eyes devouring my skin but there was something motivating him beyond simple lust. “What do you get out of this?”

The blue eyed, blonde haired mage looked back at me. I could see the wheels turning in his head. He had gotten to where he was today by cunning.

“Mags and I didn’t start off on the right foot. This is our starting point Wendell, you lie to me, we won’t get too far. What have you been promised from breaking this synchronization?”

That fake eye of his took on a sheen as he lost himself in his own little world. “Master Mage of a small private feeder magic school to the Empire.”

“And what happens to me?”

Wendell shrugged. “I was told that when your sentence is up you would be returned to that backwards planet and dumped there.”

“They stuck a chip in my head. Shouldn’t I be a citizen?”

“Should be. I don’t know.”

I was getting pissed off.

“All I can tell you is what they told me. They don’t want you, a Mark IV latent, to die when King Tiger finally loses control.”

There was a burning ball of rage forming in my core. I had thought that Mags was kidding when he said he fully expected to die out on the battlefield. Yes, he forced MI to give me up. Yes, he forced me. Based on the way my talent has been spiking and waning lately, I will admit that I manifested these...mage marks. How, I still don’t know but I have laid claim to them. Mags is wounded at the core and I’m starting to see that this Empire is the cause of it. Latents aren’t trained. They are like...well, as Wendell said, the Latents are treated like disposable batteries. The Mages are only trained to kill. They are not taught even the basics to control their power. Mom gave me that even though I never manifested an inkling of her talent. Now that Mags had served his purpose, they wanted to lose him in a final campaign. They would make his death something they could use in their propaganda machine. Either as a hero or a villain but it didn’t matter as long as King Tiger was dead.

“You can’t break the sync.”

“What was that?”

“You’re a low level Tiger. What makes you think you break a seal that a King Tiger forged?”

“...well...”
I dropped my sheet and leaned against the cell wall. I would use every weapon that I had at my disposal and the fact that Wendell had tried to start my tattoo on fire told me that he wanted my body. I could work with that.

“I could.”

“You could what?” Wendell turned and took half a step toward the metal bars.

“Break the lock, shatter the sync.” If I wanted to I could reach between the bars and ram Wendell’s head of the metal. He would be out cold and my anger would be assuaged slightly but the plan for obsolesce would still be in play. I could tell Mags control. I could strip him of power until he had it but the powers that be didn’t want that.

“You could?” Wendell’s tone told me that he didn’t believe me.

“I was there. I know what he did. However, I want a concession.” I stepped up to the cell door displaying my wares easily and confidently.

“I...I’m not authorized to make concessions.”

I ran my hand over my shoulder and down my pec until my finger tips brushed against my brown nipple. I didn’t need magic to feel his lust rising as my nipple pebbled.

“What kind of concession?”

I flicked a finger off the metal ring around me neck. “I want this off.”

“I don’t think...”

“You say a lot of I don’ts, Wendell. I want to hear, I’ll get it done.”

“What’s in it for me?”

“I think you said a mage school.”

Wendell pushed his arm through the opening between the bars laying his sweaty palm on my chest. He looked down at me one pupil dilated with excitement, the artificial one was steady. Creepy. This was no different than renting some hole back in the Shambles. Hell, Donnie would pay for someone to join us when the crew would pull off a particularly good score. I could do this.

“What’s your concession, Nicholas?” Wendell caught my pebbled nipple between his fingers and pinched hard. I shoved his hand off me. “What?”

“I don’t do pain, Wendy.”

“No problem. I want you as my Latent.”

“That all?”
“I want you in my bed.”

“Wendy, you get this off me and get me out of here, I’ll meet your concession once King Ass’s synchronization is broken.”

Wendell stood upright. His hand was still through the bars. If I didn’t want him touching me, I could have easily backed away or done something. He ruffled my hair back off my face and then turned my face to the right and left. “You have the most amazing eyes, Nicholas. It’s a shame to hide them away like that under your shaggy hair. You need a haircut.”

“I’m not yours yet.”

He moved quickly transferring his hold from my chin to the back of my neck and yanking me forward. I slammed into the bars. He bent over until our eyes were level. “I’ll get it done, Nicholas.”

Slowly he released the pressure on my neck and slipped his hand back to the freedom size of the cell. He sent me a puckered lip kiss then turned on his heel and walked away. Holy crap. I thought the government was supposed to protect you. The Empire was effectively plotting to kill Mags and to make it into a public relations event. I stared out at the stupid vid screen that was showing another stupid game. What could a banished man from the Wilds do against an Empire bent on destroying his love? His love?

I leaned against the wall and slid down to the floor. I loved him. What the hell was I supposed to do now? I couldn’t keep him safe from inside this cell that was for sure. Could I keep him safe outside this cell? Maybe not, but from the looks of things I was going to be the only one trying. I was going to have to get it done because the option...well there wasn’t an option. Damn it.