Hekate's Call, Chapter 40

Ilina’s fingers wrapped around Krystyn’s belt with undue urgency and were repelled with undue force. Standing in their poorly decorated room, with some of the empty, bare spaces filled in with various stuffed mechs made by Vigil as presents, the two of them both scowled at each other uncomfortably.

“I told you already, I don’t like being touched,” Krystyn was the first to give in. She always gave in first.

“So, what? You’ll only let me get you off if I’m wearing the strap?”

Krystyn flinched at that. She had an awful poker face. So, that was the only way it was going to happen. What, was the dumb fucking dyke still playing at being straight? Now of all times? After all those times she said she loved Ilina? After wearing a dog collar and following her around all this time?

“You don’t have to worry about me.” Sheepish and meek. Disgusting and out of character. “I can just get myself off on my own later. I’d like to focus on making you feel good.”

Ilina could taste the bile in the back of her throat. No. She didn’t like that at all. “I want to be involved.” Ilina stepped forward and planted her head into Krystyn’s chest. Deep breaths. There’s a solution here. There were several ways to compel Krystyn into obedience, but all of them were too forceful for the surrender she wanted. This needed to be given, not taken.

“I really just want to get you off,” Krystyn turned Ilina around and wrapped her arms around her, half-fondling and half-hugging. The thought was nice, but nice wasn’t what she wanted out of Krystyn. Nice wasn’t what Krystyn was good at.

“New Rule,” Ilina said firmly, reaching up behind her head to grab a fistful of Krystyn’s hair. “You need to ask my permission to touch yourself.”

“Hey, that’s not fair!” Oh! That one upset her. It stays.

“It is more than fair,” Ilina squeezed and tugged Krystyn’s short, messy hair and listened to her whine. “I know asking permission is hard for you, but you’re going to learn.”

Ilina felt a deep, hot breath on the back of her neck. She wished it was a deep throated growl, full of that anger from a moment ago rising up. If Krystyn was going to be so quick to surrender then Ilina was going to lose interest, and that would mean having to crawl back to Velia. No, that wasn’t an option. She’d have to stick it out no matter what, but it was going to suck.

Krystyn pushed off from the wall, still holding Ilina in some half-embrace. Another deep, hot breath. And then another, with something creeping in as Krystyn finally found whatever spark she needed.

“Gods, you piss me off,” Krystyn growled with some deep emotion that lit up Ilina’s brain the way it did when the Again in Hell alerted her she’d been locked onto. Finally.

Krystyn spun her around and threw her against the wall they’d been leaning against, face-first, and let her bounce back a step before checking her back into the wall with all that weight and muscle. The woman worked fast, hitting the buckle on Ilina’s pants in the same motion she heaved Ilina onto the bed. Pulled off Ilina’s pants before she could get her head on straight from the spinning and motion.

“Hey,” Ilina gasped and put an arm up to motion to stop, not that she was going to listen.

Krystyn smacked her before she could get another word out, flipping her over and shoving her face into the pillow and holding it there. “Get that ass up,” Krystyn sneered as she gave Ilina a heavy spank as encouragement.

Ilina muffled some protest weakly, head still ringing from the smack. Despite the continued spanking, Ilina pushed her rear up as best she could, bracing with her knees like she did for Velia. Did. Used to. Past tense.

“Attagirl,” Krystyn laughed, giving her a couple more spanks for good measure. “So, you just always get this wet when someone starts hitting you.”

Ilina felt Krystyn’s fingers push aside her panties and slide right into her soaking cunt. A few deep thrusts, exit, and a pause before Krysytn’s hand returned. Freak probably wanted a taste of the slick. Woman never had a real foot to stand on throwing around words like degenerate.

“You got like this during those beatings too,” Krystyn hummed to herself, taking her time making Ilina moan into the pillow. Careful not to let Ilina get out any words like stop. Not that Ilina was particularly in a rush to reach for that one. “But I always had to lube up a bunch if we were going slow.”

Krystyn pulled Ilina’s head up to growl something into her ear. “Normal girls don’t react that way to getting the shit kicked out of them. Have anything to say for yourself?”

“I’m a freak,” Ilina giggled involuntarily. It was what Krystyn wanted to hear, just like during the first beating she received. Didn’t have to be true, just needed to be what Krystyn wanted her to say. “A filthy pervert who gets off on being hit.”

She was shoved back into the pillow immediately. Harder and faster, less worried about Ilina’s comfort than she seemed to be before. Extra spanks if her ass fell. If Ilina didn’t know better, she’d think she was being spoiled on purpose. It wasn’t until the end she realized this build-up and treatment was intended to be a punishment as Krystyn pulled her hand out and rolled Ilina onto her back.

“Not going to finish what you started?” Ilina panted needily.

And there it was. Krystyn sucking at her own fingers, tongue searching for every last little bit of slick it could find, as she stared down at Ilina with almost-real contempt. Don’t back out now, you stupid bitch. Ilina was so close, right on the edge Krystyn knew so well.

“Not a very compelling argument, princess.”

Princess. Hah. That was new. She’s getting pet names instead of insults now? Krystyn really was disgustingly head-over-heels then. That was fine, as long as she could do it.

“How’s this for an argument,” Ilina tugged the remote out of her shirt and rubbed at the discipline button on it. Apparently the feedback for that was the same as the feedback for when you were in the projected course of an enemy projectile — like something dull being pushed into your skin where you were about to take a cannon shell. All she’d need to do is push the button to fire that shell and make the feeling real. Gods, she really wanted one of her own.

Krystyn froze for a second, waiting for the hit.

“If you like the taste that much,” Ilina grinned, “drink it from the source like fuck-hungry dyke you are.” Krystyn’s eyes drifted down to between Ilina’s legs and she made a face. Apprehension? “That’s an order.”

Krystyn put up a hand like she wanted a pause. Just get on with it already. Ilina could feel herself getting needy the longer she held her legs spread. “How do orders work, here?” Oh. That was the hold up? “I still don’t quite get the difference between rules, orders, and…”

“Routines,” Ilina finished for her. She propped herself up on one arm, still drawing little circles on the remote with her thumb as she explained.

It wasn’t that complicated. Routines were the little rituals one does throughout their day like washing their face in a particular way or kneeling down to kiss your better’s boots when you finish lacing them up in the morning. And then Rules were the rules, and Orders were orders. A rule might state you don’t kneel in front of anyone else, but if you’re ordered to kneel then you best be on your knees before the next heartbeat. Even an idiot like Ilina was at seventeen was able to pick up the concepts more or less instantly.

Krystyn nodded. A nervous smile forming on her lips. It was difficult to tell if she caught Vigil’s stupid during that duel of theirs or if she just liked making Ilina explain herself constantly. The former would be a problem of general competence, and the latter would have to be trained out. Another entry on the growing to-do list that was Krystyn Zechs.

“Okay,” Krystyn let out a nervous laugh. “So I better get to this. I haven’t,” she glanced back down between Ilian’s legs. “I haven’t done this before.”

“I’ll make sure you get lots of practice, then,” Ilina flashed her fanged little grin and watched Krystyn turn red.

She watched Krystyn try to figure out how to get in comfortably, and to her credit it took her less than a minute to get off the bed and onto the floor. Half holding up Ilina’s weight and half keeping her spread wide, giving herself just enough of a sight line to watch Ilina’s reactions.

Once she started though, Ilina didn’t really have much feedback to give. The initial exploratory probes could have been mistaken for deliberate teasing, and mixing sensations between tongue, suction, and teeth were all well employed. A couple shifting motions to free one arm and her stupid mutt slid in a pair of fingers while still tonguing the clit. Fuck. And she already knew where to put her fingers to get instant reactions out of her. Krystyn was a fucking natural. How this woman ever could have imagined herself straight?

Ilina grabbed a fistful of Krystyn’s hair desperately as she came the first time. She dug her heels into the woman’s back as she arched at the second. Krystyn tapped out before there was a third, which was probably for the best because the first two waves of chemical delight hit her brain like a flood tide.

By the time that Krystyn had made it back up to the bed, Ilina felt herself drifting off.

“So,” Krystyn was hesitating, wiping around her mouth with the collar of her shirt while she found whatever stupid words she was looking for. They were always stupid after sex. “What happens if I break a Rule?”

See? Stupid. Ilina could only think of one punishment that actually mattered, and the knowledge that it was based on the same logic Velia had was like a knife in her gut. But it would work on Krystyn.

“If you break a Rule,” Ilina forced herself to focus, “you aren’t allowed to touch me for a week.”

“A whole week?” Krystyn practically shouted. She wore an expression she hadn’t worn before in front of Ilina, vulnerable and distraught. “That’s really not fair, you know.”

It was exceedingly fair. It was more fair than any punishment Ilina ever got. She’d only ever been given unfair rules that she couldn’t possibly follow and the punishments were both severe and whimsical. Ilina had been trapped in a system where she could never win, destined to be ground under heel for eternity. There was comfort in that. But Krystyn wasn’t the kind who would accept real unfairness. She was used to being the one who was unfair.

“Tell me your rules.”

Krystyn leaned against the wall and wrapped her fingers around her collar. Gods below, she really was something else when that front of hers started to crack. She cleared her throat and began to recall them.

“You’re the only one who can put on or take off the collar — I can take it off in an emergency if we need to suit up for battle, but that’s the only exception. I’m not allowed to lay hands on anyone else without permission." Krystyn paused and chewed her lip. “I think I’m missing one,” she trailed off.

“You rolled together no assaulting anyone and don’t fuck anyone else without asking into one rule,” Ilina hoped she could hide her smile about that. Krystyn really didn’t draw a line between those things, did she?

“Right,” Krystyn laughed. “And the new one.”

And then she made that dumb face, like a virgin who was still too nervous to use the words for what she thought she wanted. Ilina reminded herself she needed to be patient. Disobedience was to be met with punishment, and failure was to be met with patience, understanding, and encouragement — the way Morian taught her to deal with the other Fiends.

“You have to go out of your way to break any of those rules,” Ilina rolled away from Krystyn and onto her side. “Besides, all you have to do is ask permission.”

-  -  -

Krystyn washed her face, brushed her teeth, and rinsed out her mouth like she was told. Ilina was poking fun at her, holding her position above her by refusing to kiss her until she’d done so. Going down on a girl — Woman. She and Vigil had joked that they were lucky Ilina had hair in all the right places otherwise they would both look real bad. Joked. — wasn’t that difficult once you got over the mental hurdle involved.

It’s probably just internalized homophobia. You are from Domon, after all.

Morian was blunt, but it helped. Putting a name to those feelings helped. Therapy was helping. She hated the idea of having the god damn Corpse Eater pick at her brain and insecurities, but she couldn’t deny the results.

If it helps at all, I’ve seen your victim profile. Pretty little things, aren’t they? Effeminate.

She splashed cold water over her face and dried it off with a towel. It took her a few moments before she worked up the courage to look herself in the mirror. She had plenty of time, after all Ilina was probably curled up into a little ball snoring away by now. Charlotte Fellows was still there, staring at her. Hell, she looked more like that woman now more than ever.

Krystyn smiled like she used to. That smile that they put on the posters and pamphlets all those years ago. Big fish in a small pond out on some edge world, as far away as she could manage from where she served. Charlotte’s award winning smile, only thirty to forty percent sleaze.

You a fucking queer, Charlotte? No. If the Corpse Eater was right about you, you’re worse than that. Pretty little things all with that same sense of unease to them. Apologized too much. Kept their heads down. Blushed at the attention you gave them. Never sure where to put their hands. They’d let you do anything to them as long as you never remind them they’re just swine. Didn’t even need to separate them from the crowd, they did that all on their own. Lots of boys like that back home.

Chaser.

Velia was one of them, too. Probably took one look at the bruised faces and sad eyes in Crater’s insurance folders and clocked them all, and by proxy Krystyn. Takes one to know one after all. Tranny see tranny. Predator recognize predator.

Everyone on this ship was the exact same.

They were all better off dead.

Especially Morian Kyrnn. Fuck. She’d tried to push the images of the Necromancer’s blood pooling on the floor of the medbay before vanishing along with the body. Before the woman stepped into her line of sight like she’d been waiting off stage for a moment while the special effect played.

Breathe.

She had to do the breathing exercise. There were other rituals the doctor taught her to keep herself from spiraling like this. Things you could touch, things you could verify, places you could remember. Anchors to the real. Krystyn did one after the other until her breathing was steady and her heart rate stabilized.

The way Morian treated her was so strange. Everyone else treated Krystyn like the radioactive waste she was. A monster barely kept in check, caged for everyone else’s safety and kept on a short leash. But Morian always had the same weary but empathetic smile on her lips whenever Krystyn showed up for an appointment. The same friendly, concerned voice when she asked Krystyn how she was holding up.

What a choice of words. Most people started conversations by asking how you were doing, but the Necromancer knew she was barely holding it together and didn’t dance around it. But she was helping. If not the exercises, or putting words to her feelings, it was something so much more embarrassing.

Kyrnn genuinely seemed like she wanted to help.

Just thinking about it made her want to dry-heave into the trash. Ilina promising to protect her. Manya telling her she’d been in love with her. Kyrnn wanting to see her heal. Just when exactly did any of them start to care about her wellbeing? Why were the only people who purported to care about her monsters?

Well, as far as monsters go, Krystyn probably looked like bait fish to the Corpse Eater. Now that was a comforting, dangerous thought: no matter what Krystyn did, the Necromancer would always be worse.

The door to the bedroom had chimed several times but she’d missed the sound while she was busy narrowly avoiding another attack. Before she could get out of the little washroom to check it, Ilina had stirred and let them in.

Elisabet Crater stood just inside the room the most disheveled Krystyn had ever seen her. A few buttons undone at the top of her unpressed shirt, not even properly tucked in. The bags under her eyes had gotten better since she let Velia take over the pilots, but it made her face look just a little wrong and maybe a little hungover. Not exactly the picture of imperial excellence.

And gods below, Ilina. Manya lounged about naked all the time, sexily at all times. But Ilina spread out and tangled in the bedsheets, naked and covered in bruises, looked downright pornographic. And Ilina made no attempt to cover herself as Crater took in the sight, no doubt reverse-engineering Ilina’s latest encounters in her mind in shocking detail. Crater was always too good at that, and Krystyn had been rather thankful to avoid most of that vivisecting gaze.

“May I sit?” She asked Ilina, the front of politeness faltering in the face of pure exhaustion.

“Yeah.”

Crater moved and sat on the bed towards Ilina’s head, which immediately prompted Krystyn to go and sit at the opposite end. Crater and Krystyn exchanged empty-eyed looks, more to acknowledge each other’s existence rather than communicate anything unspoken between them.

“You shot a superior officer, Falke.”

She what?

“No,” Ilina’s voice was flat and unreadable and her eyes never drifted to look at Elisabet. “I shot an employee of Hekate’s Call.”

“I see,” Elisabet put her head in her hands and exhaled. “Impairing the company’s functions is a breach of contract.”

“No,” Ilina repeated with that same empty voice. “Velia Lore serves in an administrative capacity, and the injury sustained does not compromise her ability to serve in her role. This does not disrupt the company’s functions.”

Crater clasped her hands and stared at the floor. No slow, measured response? No vivisecting comments? The woman had lost her edge since Morian dropped her to the ground with a few claps of those bony hands.

Krystyn attempted to move the sheet to cover Ilina, but was swatted away. Ilina was in business mode, somehow. Why was this the first that Krystyn was hearing of this shooting? Velia was okay, but injured, but not severely enough to hinder her work. What the fuck happened between them?

“You shot your girlfriend.” She didn’t even attempt to hide her desperation for some kind of footing to discuss this with Ilina. Any position to approach this from where Ilina had to actually talk to her. Gods, Liz, you don’t talk to anyone like this.

Ilina was quiet just long enough that Crater took another breath to speak. “Did you hear what she did?”

Relief. “I only know what Morian told me.”

Morian. Not Dr. Kyrnn. Familiarity, shown in private but not public. Classic Crater, never letting on how deep they went in front of everyone. Krystyn got the same treatment. Field-Commander Zechs in the war room, but Krystyn behind closed doors — Charlotte if Crater was in a bad mood, or especially tired.

“Velia told me to go screw Symeon so she’d stop filing accommodation requests and wasting her time.”

Krystyn’s stomach churned. That was why Ilina insisted on going over? That was what that was about? She was going to go without Krystyn and could have been injured. Fuck, maybe worse. Maybe Symeon loses it like she does when she smells blood on the battlefield and kills Ilina. And Velia ordered her to—

Elisabet nodded. “That’s an excessive overreach of her authority. I will remind her to talk to me about any issues with Symeon, and I will stop Symeon from drowning her in paperwork.”

“So, Velia gets a slap on the wrist.”

“I think being shot is consequence enough,” she glanced over at all of Ilina’s bruises. “Don’t you?”

Ilina yawned and stretched out on the bed, and Krystyn caught sight of some slick still glistening in her bush. How could anyone hold a conversation in this state? It seemed answer enough for Elisabet, though she didn’t stand to leave the room.

“What’s going on between you and the old hag?” Ilina’s voice perked up, and she looked up at Liz with some kind of sneer. “Why are you so fixated on her?”

Crater stared at the wall opposite, weighing the options. Talk or don’t. Which was riskier? Giving Ilina the leverage, or getting on her bad side. Neither option was particularly appealing, and Krystyn sure didn’t envy being in that position.

“I was her apprentice,” Crater said finally.

The little punching bag let out a loud and sharp laugh. “She doesn’t take apprentices. I watched her turn down dozens of them over the years.”

Crater winced at that. “She does take apprentices. But only one at a time, and she won’t take another until either her current apprentice masters what she’s taught, or until the apprentice dies.” A groaning chuckle found its way out of Crater’s throat somehow. “I’ve been her personal failure for many years.”

When exactly were you studying under the Corpse Eater? Krystyn wanted to jump in and start tearing that story to pieces because Liz was as fresh-faced out of the special officer’s school as Krystyn was out of infantry when they first crossed paths. That was years before they met again in mechanized infantry, and Crater had been so diligently advancing her career in that time.

Somewhere in their little chat, their hands touched. Ilina and Elisabet, hands brushing up against each other for a moment before grasping one another in some kind of mutual understanding. Not quite romantic. Two damaged people sharing some feeling about the same woman.

Krystyn felt so far away from them both.

She felt alone.

“Disgusting,” Ilina laughed. “You’re in love with her.”

Their hands squeezed again and Liz matched the laugh. “It can’t be that obvious, can it?”

“Don’t be embarrassed,” Ilina sighed. “You aren’t the first, and won’t be the last.”

Krystyn was desperately trying not to think about the reasons why Liz started the company in the first place. Putting aside the issue of when she had time to study under the monster. There was no timeline that made sense unless the woman was a literal child during her apprenticeship. Was it all just to impress the Necromancer? That felt like a disgusting betrayal of everyone’s trust. Endangering hundreds of people to try to earn a date and a second chance or something?

Not that there was any trust to betray. Unlike the rest of the staff, none of the pilots were given the choice to sign up or walk away.

Elisabet stood up and smoothed out her clothes, somewhat calmer than when she arrived. Gave Krystyn a nod before turning to face Ilina directly. “I know you love her too, Falke.”

“That’s different.” Ilina sat up and prodded at a few of her sore spots. “I’m the last remaining Fiend of the Corpse Eater. I have to look after her. For them.”

The last remaining Fiend of the Corpse Eater. Was that how she saw herself? Morian Kyrnn’s knight-protector. A body to put in front of an immortal monster. Might as well be fodder. Morian didn’t need protection. She needed to die.

“I see,” Elisabet was about to say more but stopped herself. She straightened her posture and bowed deeply towards Ilina. “My sincerest condolences for the deaths of the others.”

“Thank you.” Ilina bowed her head slightly in return, uncharacteristically. “It doesn’t mean much. They aren’t coming back. But, thank you.”

Everything found its way back to Morian Krynn somehow, and no matter how much time passed, she would be second-at-best in anyone’s eyes to that thing. The feeling was starting to tear her apart.

Elisabet and Ilina said their goodbyes and Krystyn barely got a nod of acknowledgment on the way out.

“Don’t tell Morian about any of that,” Ilina reached out and touched Krystyn’s arm. “She doesn’t—“

“She doesn’t like when people say that they love her,” Krystyn finished. She heard the same thing from Velia too. Who wasn’t in love with the monster? It felt like it was just her and Manya. Symeon too, but she was still programmed to sit, roll over, and kill at Crater’s command and wasn’t really capable of anything else no matter how much she’d started to act like a real person.

Ilina yawned and fell back onto the bed. “It makes her anxious,” spoken through the pillow.

Anxious! Something about the image of the Corpse Eater blushing and stammering at a love confession was charming and inconceivable. Well, she wasn’t the only one who got anxious hearing those words. Her little knight-protector had the same same issue.

Krystyn stared the little freak, and at all those bruises. She tried not to stare at them too long, but it was hard not to admire her own handiwork. How accurately could Crater reconstruct what had happened? Krystyn could look at each bruise and remember exactly when she or Vigil had put it there, in what position they had Ilina, and exactly what sounds the girl made.

“So,” Krystyn cleared her throat. “Can I, uh, go get off?”

Ilina turned immediately and without a shred of hesitation or shame asked, “Can I watch?”

“No!” Fuck. That was probably the wrong answer. But she was going to stand by it now that she said it. It wasn’t going to be anything sexy either, just her grunting silently in the washroom with her hand down the front of her pants. Gosh. “Who the fuck wants to watch something like that?”

Ilina pouted. Pouted. And rolled away. “Then no. You can tomorrow though.”