Chapter 81 - Consoling the Inconsolable
"A'ight. Since the educators start tomorrow, you girls get a three-hour break. I would suggest a bath, food, and nap, in that order." Zen finishes shucking her final pair of sand-filled leathers, then languidly stretches her arms out to the sides. "This afternoon we're practicin' blade-work and positioning. Then you all owe me two more obstacle-courses with these stupid suits on."
A chorus of loud groans sound out from the teens spread out on the ground, and the short Cat-woman can only grin at the thought of how easily baited these girls were into making horrible bets. "Blame yourselves. Anyways, I got some stuff t' do. Three hours."
Zen whirls around to leave the exhausted candidates behind, and fully moves outside of the training-dome before accessing her pouch to withdraw the enchanted hand-mirror.
After forcing in a little bit of magic, she calls up an image of a certain cry-baby ginger-nut, but then she's got to waggle the mirror all around in an attempt to find her.
It was obvious that Chastity had returned to her room at Kuro and Shiro, since this stupid thing wouldn't show a vision of it if she hadn't... so where- "Ah. In the closet."
The small Scout frowns at the sight of a slightly-open door and the curled-up red-head in behind. Hiding like that probably spoke to some rather large psychological problems... ehn. Whatever.
With a shrug, Zen creates a bubble around herself, another inside of the silly girl's room, then gives the mental-command to create a link and swap positions. Almost immediately, she finds herself at this new location, then blinks twice towards the un-kempt bed before whirling around to face the closet. "Oi. Get outta there."
Chastity issues a squeak at the un-expected voice, perhaps to be expected since she'd barred the door.
"Come on. Don't make me drag you out."
"W-what... how did you get in here?!"
"Ask how I found you, first."
"How... did you find me?!"
"I'm omnipotent. Now ask how I got in here."
"W-what... what's 'omnipotent'?"
"I see all."
"Liar."
"Well, not all the time. But I can see all." The short Cat-woman moves over to the bed and whirls to sit on the edge. "You heard that I was the one to teleport some of your Sisters to Jozejemi and Kileah, right? Part of that process involves using a high-banned magic-tool to remotely view the location. And I can also use that to look at specific people."
"That's... disgusting."
"It's hilarious. Here... let's see what the King is doin' right now... bah. Boring. He's talking to some other old people."
Chastity reaches over to push the closet-door open a little further. "Y... you can seriously see him?"
"Hm? I told ya, right? I can see all."
"Bull."
"Come see."
The heavily-freckled human frowns at the obvious attempt at baiting her, but since she'd already spent three hours inside of her safe-place, it was about time she got out, anyways.
Zen lifts her view from the illegal magic-tool to watch the ginger crawl out of the closet before standing, then the girl checks around the corner and issues a snort before plodding over to flop at her side. "See? He's obviously the one with the ostantacious golden crown."
"I-I... can't believe it..."
"Y'know... I could probably manage to steal that thing right off his head..."
"Please don't."
"Why? No-one would know it was us."
"You. Don't drag me into it."
"You don't need a King's crown?"
"No. And neither do you."
"Ehn, whatever. I'll keep the option open, for when I'm Emperor."
"You're a woman... you'd be Empress."
"That's too girly. I wanna be an Emperor."
Chastity lets out a heavy sigh while looking away from the old man in the mirrror. "Whatever. Do what you want."
"I always do. But you don't."
"Don't what."
"Do what you want."
"Of course not! How could I?!"
"What's stoppin' you?"
The red-headed teen blinks twice before issuing an expression that questions the feline's sanity. "Because I'm a SLAVE!"
"You were a slave."
"I-I still AM!"
"You are?"
"YES!"
"A slave to what?"
Again, Chastity blinks a few times in confusion, then shakes away her thoughts and displays a frown. "I'm your slave. You bought me."
"I freed you."
"Hardly."
"Sure I did."
"When."
"The moment I handed over the money."
"Then why'd you bring me here?"
"Where else would you go?"
"HOME!"
"Where's that?"
"It's... not here."
"So where is it?"
The freckled teen averts her gaze while glowering at the thought of her true 'home'. "In the north-east..."
"Here." Zen places the illegal magic-tool onto the waifish girl's lap, then flops back onto the bed to make herself more comfortable. "Jus' force a little magic into that thing, an' think of a place or person you wanna see. Might hafta move it around a lil' to view 'em, though."
Chastity stares down at the silver hand-mirror with a mixture of hesitation and fear. Not because she was loathe to use it... more that she didn't want to see what it would show her.
"Whaddya waitin' for? Take a look at your home."
The red-headed teen issues a snort of annoyance, then scoops up the mirror and does as previously instructed. Within moments the interior a familiar, dingy shack appears, and all she has to do is move the viewer a little to the left in order to spy on the two traitors she immediately hates more than anything else in the world.
Seated at a roughly-hewn dining-table were her parents. Her ginger father and mousey-brown-haired mother. Eating a meal together. Smiling. Perhaps making comments about how good their lives now were.
When she'd been living there, they never ate lunch. They couldn't afford it. Instead, it was just some crappy gruel for breakfast, and a dinner of forraged forest mushrooms with nearly-spoiled meats.
Those feckers.
They claimed to be heavily in debt, and that they'd signed a work-contract for her to labour in a normal store-front... yet the back of the business just held a number of cages.
Of course, she hadn't spent more than a couple of nights inside of the iron bars before being transported to another town, then a city... where she'd but but on display and sold to a cruel, evil man.
For months and years Chastity had deluded herself into thinking that her parents would realize what had happened, and would fight tooth and nail in order to get her back...
And yet... there they were... smiling and eating lunch...
"Who're they?"
"N... nobody..."
Zen drops her head back down to the mattress as her candidate fails to conceal wiping the tears from her cheeks. "Rough life, huh."
"Hmph."
"Yeah. Probably just as bad as growin' up a Beastkin. Though I had it a lot better 'n most. My father's a pretentious human noble, mother a Felindae scullery maid. 'Course, there was no way I'd ever be claimed, so I jus' lived in the servants' quarters." The small Scout allows a soft sigh to float away. "Some 'f the earliest memories I've got is a buncha humans insulting me. Grabbin' my tail so hard I thought they were gonna rip it off. Tellin' me I was trash and disgustin' just fer bein' born. Gettin' these glares from them every time I came into sight. I swear, if they didn't know who my father really was, I prob'ly woulda been tossed out on my ass, or just murdered for no reason at all."
The ginger teen cuts the power being supplied to the hand-mirror, then places it off to the side where she can't be tempted to sate her curiosity further. "I... grew up with... nothing. Wore rags. Lived in the slums..."
"Never had a chance, then."
"Not... really..."
"Most of your Sisters are the same. Either they've come from nothing, or they never woulda been given a chance to make themselves better. Now, though, everyone has the opportunity to do anything they want. But, first, you all have to learn to defend yourselves from being taking advantage of."
"Mm..."
"Y'know, you don't have to become a Scout if you don' want to."
"Mm..."
"I just happen to think you'll be able to harness all that anger y' got buried inside you. And when you do, you're going to be a force. Stronger and more fearsome than anyone else." Zen pulls herself up into a sitting-position, then stores her hand-mirror before popping up to her feet. "But your Sisters are not your enemy. Each of you have been through Hell, even Ezra."
Chastity dips her head down and scowls at the thought of the luckiest girl in the Sisterhood. The one who hadn't gotten defiled.
"Oh. You don't think so, huh?" The short Cat-woman frowns as she folds her arms in front of her chest. "You think she wasn't terrified? That she wasn't quaking in fear at the thought of what was gonna happen to her? You think an experience like that is easy to overcome?"
"O-of course not."
"Exactly. An' you know she tried to run away just after she got here, right?"
"Yeah. So?"
"She wanted to leave because she felt she wasn't damaged enough to warrant such good fortune. She actually wanted to give her spot to someone more deserving." Zen issues a snort of derision as she tosses a scowl off to the side. "Feckin' idiot woulda frozen to death.. an' for what. A misguided sense of morality. A sense of ethics so twisted by her recent ordeals that it actually sounded noble in her head to go off and die."
"D-didn't she..."
"Hah?"
"She didn't... have supplies?"
"Feck, no. Didn't even wear a fecking coat." The small Scout rolls her eyes at the thought of such stupidity. "Imagine. Getting fecking saved from slavery, but choosing death because she hadn't been raped."
"T-that's... pretty dumb..."
"Hmph. Y'think? Almost as silly as selling a girl named 'Chastity' into sexual-slavery."
The ginger teen blinks twice, then brings a confused and hurt expression up to insensitive feline.
"Whut."
"W-why would you say that?!"
"Huh? What. It's stupid, ain't it. Chastity. You need a new name."
Chastity feels tears springing up to cloud her eyes again, so she quickly dips her head back down.
"Sorry. Was just thinking that every time you heard it, you'd be thinkin' 'bout what was taken from you."
"Mm... that's... yeah..."
"Alright. Then you're now Muffin."
The red-headed girl issues a sound half-way between a laugh and a sob.
"What. No good? Damnit. Woulda been hilarious. Hmm... Snowflake."
"No."
"Why not?"
"W-with my hair? No."
"Oh. Good point. Well, can't call yah 'Freckles', 'cause that's kinda insulting." Zen whirls around and begins to pace across the room, only to spin back around after only two steps. "Calamity."
"What?"
"'Calamity'. Means disaster, catastrophe, tragedy-"
"Come on!"
"And also means adversity, tribulation, and misfortune... all of which are things that you've broken free from."
The ginger-nut's mouth moves in silence for a few moments as she attempts to find the words to refuse the monicker... but the more that she thinks about it, the more fitting it seems.
"Yup. You're definitely a calamity."
"I don't like how you put it that way."
"Whut. It suits you. So own it."
"H-how?"
"By trying your hardest. Building your strength. Learn how to visit a kind of devistation upon your enemies that they'd be whispered about in fear for centuries."
"B-but-"
"Oh. You think I'ma let you get out of training as a Scout? Sorry, no."
"Why?!"
"You kidding? You broke two daggers going through your first obstacle course." Zen displays a wicked grin while looking over the thin girl's frame for evidence of the power that she commanded. "I carved 'em all myself. From heart-woods. It'd take a lot of force to snap one a those."
"S-so? I bet loads of others did that."
"One. Darya."
Calamity blinks twice before averting her gaze. "J-just her?"
"An' she only broke one, on the last segment. You had to ease up after just the second part of the course."
"Y-you must've... carved them wrong."
"You sunk one three inches into a solid wooden block."
"It... was rotten, or something."
"Yuh-huh. Y'know, I call Jana a brute... but I should saved that name for you."
"Hmph. I don' wanna be known as that."
"Well, you're now a certified Calamity, so time will tell if it's worse or not."
"Lovely."
"Yup. So, uh..." Zen stares towards the ginger on the bed, then just shrugs and whirls around to head for the door. "No education today, so there's two hours and forty minutes 'til the afternoon trainin'. Daggers an' foot-work. The others owe me two courses with suits, after. You owe me three."
"Y-yeah..."
"And no more bullying, right? You're better than that."
"Yeah."
"Good." The small Scout yanks back on the stout iron bar holding the door in place, then waives a hand over her shoulder as a fare-well. "Don't burn the place down, Calamity."
"S-shut up."